


Closest

by likeamadonna



Category: U2
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-13
Updated: 2016-06-17
Packaged: 2018-07-14 20:11:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 33,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7188374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/likeamadonna/pseuds/likeamadonna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Errata: I hate how Pink was appropriated by Victoria's Secret during the years after I wrote this. I blatantly stole an idea from the movie Bull Durham for this chapter, and with this edit, B busts me on it. Geisha are from Japan, of course, but from what I've read, they have equivalents in China, and god damn it, I couldn't resist having B sing that song. Apologies.</p><p>A couple of weeks ago my husband asked me, "What's the sexiest thing you've had them do?" I immediately thought of this chapter and was able to sum it up in six words.  </p><p>Having said that, I hope you enjoy the next 10,000 words. :)</p>
    </blockquote>





	1. Coffee/Museum/Pink/Pinker

**Author's Note:**

> Errata: I hate how Pink was appropriated by Victoria's Secret during the years after I wrote this. I blatantly stole an idea from the movie Bull Durham for this chapter, and with this edit, B busts me on it. Geisha are from Japan, of course, but from what I've read, they have equivalents in China, and god damn it, I couldn't resist having B sing that song. Apologies.
> 
> A couple of weeks ago my husband asked me, "What's the sexiest thing you've had them do?" I immediately thought of this chapter and was able to sum it up in six words. 
> 
> Having said that, I hope you enjoy the next 10,000 words. :)

1: Coffee.

(Make it stop. That noise...that...planet-shattering noise.)

"Hello."

"Edge. Did I wake you?"

"It's...three o'clock in the morning."

"Oh Christ. I'm sorry. I just wanted you to know I'll be there in about twelve hours. And...ehm..."

"What do you want me to do, Bono?"

"When they pick me up at the airport could you be there, too?"

"I suppose..."

"Sleepy darling."

"Mmm. Thanks for the call last night."

"Hit the spot, didn't it?"

"On a cosmic scale. Listening to your phone-voice is always a total pleasure."

"Would you like some more?"

"That's all right. How is everything over there?"

"We talked. It's...better. I'm glad I could be with her this weekend, but now I miss you. I'm filled with this restless energy."

"I see."

"What are you going to do today?"

"I think I'll go to the Museum of Natural History. Read a few letters. Pick up some rough trade at the airport, apparently."

"Thank you. Please let it be tonight, Edge. I'm ready."

"We'll see."

"I love New York."

"Say it."

"Fuck me, Edge..."

"I love you, baby."

"Sweet dreams."

(It's going to be tonight, isn't it?)

Eighty-five percent sure.

(Let's go back to sleep, shall we Reg? I want to seduce the other fifteen percent of you.)

Take your best shot.

(Close your eyes then. I'll give you a good dream. Starring me of course, hmm...lying on a lush bed of peacock feathers.)

Peafowl.

(Cock, love. Cock. That's what I want to sleep with tonight.)

You have a singular talent for...

(Yes, I do. Guess who is my co-star? You are holding five lovely peacock feathers, gently trailing them down the length of my body. Look at those hundreds of tiny fringe fingers, the five turquoise peacock eyes, oh, and the room smells like some kind of cinnamon candy. Roll me over, love, yes, run them across my arched back and lower...mmm, you call that a spanking? The back of my knees and my ankles are so ticklish this morning. I beg you to stop. I beg you to start. Outside, twin yellow funnel clouds approach and rock our bed, their shrieking din drowning out my cries as you take me at last. And then we're lifted up, spiraling weightlessly inside one of the funnels as countless feathers whip around us. You bite my shoulder, and the feathers turn into white paper, and...no. Not this again, Reg. Why do you do this to yourself, or better yet, why do you do this to me? Quadratic equations are not sexy, and I refuse to stick around and watch you do math. I'll see you in the morning, love.)

........................................................................................

(Coffee...)

Here we are again. At least, here I am again.

(I wish I were here too. That sounds odd. You know what I mean.)

It's not the same Plaza without you.

(Reg?)

Yes?

(Coffee...)

You can wait until ten.

(And that's in four hours. Hilarious, my dear. Remember the morning after we became--how did you put it--a bit more than blood brothers?)

You had just taken a shower and were bouncing off the walls.

(My euphoria was almost out of hand. Hence the need for caffeine.)

You pulled the phone into bed, pounced on me, and placed your call, punctuating your demands with kisses and giggles.

('Room service please, and I'd like to speak with Heidi if she's available...listen to this, Reg--oh, and I now own this little hollow, I hope you know...mmm, yes--Heidi! How are you this beautiful morning, my darling?...Merely wonderful...Thank you, love...You will never be without tickets as long as we play your fair city's quaint arenas and stadiums...Here's how you can thank me. I need two kinds of coffee: iced and regular. You do have iced coffee, yes?...Of course you do. And by regular coffee I mean regular, incredibly good coffee, Okay?...ohh...I don't want you sending up your gourmet Samoan hazelnut blend with special chicory enzymes or whatever...You! Stop it!...I'm sorry, Heidi. Not you. I am having trouble with assorted personnel...So. The two kinds of coffee, and I'm in the mood for cake...ahh, lemon sounds delicious...1013 is absolutely correct...wait, you're not spying on me, are you, Heidi?...Maybe just a little bit?...How many fingers am I holding up?...Sorry. One...We'll play again some other time. Fetch my coffee, love.')

You smothered my face in your damp towel, singing its praises.

('This towel is so plush. I want to propose to it. Towel: marry me. Is this OK with you, sir?')

I said I hoped you and your towel would be very happy together.

(I still can't believe I'm actually calling you sir sometimes.)

It's a postmodern, ironic, kinky kind of gay sir, I assure you.

(It better be.)

One of our code words.

('Bono, Paul said he wants to see you.' 'Yes, sir.' That just never gets old, does it?)

You love to watch me squirm.

(Turnabout is fair play, Reg, sir.)

That reminds me--it's time to turn the calendar page.

(September already?)

Indeed it is.

(Get out of bed and describe the sunrise for me, Reg.)

You'll be following the sun today.

(The sun will bring me back to you, love.)

Yes. I should always request an east-facing view, although this sunrise is not going to win any scenic ribbons. The fraction of the sun that is not blocked by buildings is orange, like orange waiting room chairs, surrounded by an opaque sky the color of...unbrushed teeth.

(How picturesque! Weather, please.)

I'm predicting near uterine temperatures and a hazy scum of clouds.

(Soon to be pierced by a certain jet carrying a certain protean rock star who loves you.)

Even at this height the sound-carpet of engines, wheels, and plaintive horns remains. So many people are down there already, swarming.

(Enough to fill Yankee Stadium. Twice.)

It's funny--I wasn't a bit tense with those screens behind me. This tour reminds me of those days at school when I'd have to give some kind of speech. The more charts and visual aids I'd prepare, the more comfortable I would feel standing in front of everyone. People weren't looking at me the entire time. So the new stage is perfect for me.

(And what about me?)

You've always been the ultimate visual aid, Bono.

(You were magnificent as usual.)

Thank you.

(And...?)

You were magnificent as usual, too.

(Oh, why thank you, Reg!)

Then you flew home to see her.

(Ali...I've never heard that neediness in her voice before. I told her I'd be there as soon as the New York concerts were over.)

I know.

(She was crying. I had to go, just for one day.)

I know.

(But you were jealous.)

A little. This hasn't been easy.

(Poor Reg. I sounded OK this morning, though.)

Maybe you finally had The Discussion.

(Then I truly would have earned it. Why don't you read a letter? I do believe you'll find the earliest ones in a folder marked 'B-Mar.' I like the one where I used a red pen, writing on your face and down your arm...in typically breathless prose.)

You tore it from a tour program--a photo of me playing...it's somewhat blurred, but that's got to be the Explorer.

(In profile, naturally. Dead serious, naturally.)

.............................................................................

_The very next day._

_Edge, Edge. I can't even think today. I keep fixating on last night, your body, our bed, and tonight, your body, our bed. I'm on the cusp of sleep in a narcoleptically comfortable chair and it's mid-afternoon. How I love this eye. And your face--graceful and economical--makes my own seem ridiculously baroque. You were right; it is far too easy, this twenty-four hour access we have to each other. While I could effortlessly become a glutton for you, feasting on this neck, for example, or kneeling before you at even the slightest provocation, I trust your unerring restraint. I now have a prurient interest in your unique methods of control--Christ, look what you've accomplished so far, and you've barely laid a finger on me. It's not enough for me to want you. After this evening I'll have to earn you. Sex between us will not be a given every night; therefore, I'll want it more. And so will you. Edge, my lover, I place myself in your extraordinary left hand._

_B._

....................................................................................

(You want me now.)

That first night in front of the mirror...

(Watching me.)

I loved your mouth, that sly smile. Your startling eyes monitored my reactions and then closed as you listened to my story.

(Going down on me.)

And hearing those lascivious little noises turn into screams...my God.

(You should be louder for me, Reg. You now how I'd love to make you lose that reserve, just for a minute.)

We'll see.

('We'll see.' I orchestrate things as much as you do. If not more so.)

Is that a fact?

(Oh, I'm sorry-I should never interrupt any onanistic thoughts you might be having regarding me. Go on, love. What's it like to sleep with me?)

Challenging.

(No. Really?)

Blankets and pillows are items that couples typically share...it's like you're trying to build a fort or something.

(How cute and dare I say boyish of me.)

That first night, though, you must have been completely exhausted. You slept in my arms, completely still, breathing quietly. Your body was so warm.

(And yours was cool...we were like two different kinds of coffee.)

Oh yes--when it arrived later that morning...

(...with too much cake and a darling collage with too many exclamation points...)

...you presented me with the glass of iced coffee.

(It was an experiment. I had a cup of incredibly good regular coffee. The instant you finished yours I quickly drank the rest of mine and kissed you.)

Your searing tongue thawed my frozen mouth. It was as if I could see your tongue. The sensation was marvelously erotic, and as you slowly pulled away, in the space between our lips we saw...

(...steam.)

 

2: Museum.

"Where to?"

"Museum of Natural History."

"Lemme guess. Irish?"

"That's right."

"Welcome to New York. Gonna be another scorcher."

(It's so easy for you to disguise yourself, Reg. Take off the hat, put on some fake glasses, and you're Mr. Inscrutable.)

Museums are good for that reason. Everybody is too busy gawking at dinosaurs and totem poles to do any serious people-watching. And most of the exhibition spaces in this one are pretty dark.

(That radio static is getting annoying.)

I don't know. I kind of like it. It's as if someone far away is trying to send me a message.

(I'm getting closer with each passing second. How fast does a plane go, Reg?)

Around 600 miles per hour.

(So with every second...)

I'll have to use a calculator.

(All the titanium in the world still can't keep a calculator watch from looking...just so desperately sad.)

You bought it for me.

(And it's nice to see you getting some good out of your birthday present. So. I'm being hurled through space at...)

880 feet per second.

(Staggering.)

"This OK?"

"Great."

"You are in for a treat, my Irish friend. Give the elephants my best."

(How sweet.)

He wants a big tip, hence the sweetness.

(I know. Like I'm sure this guy even cares.)

"Thanks."

.........................................................

(This place is colossal.)

Quite an entrance hall.

(Its acoustics recall some of the Beatles' more conceptual stuff.)

You've got a point there. We have four hours.

(I'm already feeling that overload headache I always get in museums. I assume you have several thousand boring dioramas to examine...?

I love you, B. This map says North American mammals are straight ahead.

(And look. Run, don't walk, to 'Mollusks and Our World'! We'll be checking out that exhibit for sure.)

You laugh, but we will.

(Not surprised. Well, well. This is something like a zoo, but it's a zoo without the bad smells and the screaming babies. That kind of zoo. I am enchanted.)

I'm not so sure. It's extremely well-done: life-sized dioramas of taxidermied animals in their natural habitats, beautifully lit, vegetation faithfully reproduced...

(And those backgrounds...)

...They could stand on their own as superb landscape paintings. But everything is behind glass and so static. It makes me think about the children who live in New York. This could be as close as some  
of them will get to seeing the beauty of the wilderness.

(Now you're making me sad.)

I don't mean to; I'm just thankful that I grew up in an area where I could investigate nature.

(What a magnificent elk.)

They definitely arrange them in mythic poses to create optimal drama.

(It's kind of creepy. That animal was once real, walking around from place to place, engaging in ruttish behavior. Talk to me about rut, please.)

Elsewhere in this museum are dioramas of people: Native Americans, African tribes, Asian civilizations...not with real people, of course.

(Maybe hundreds of years from now we'll be here too--'Twentieth Century Irish Musicians.')

Better figure out your most mythic pose now, B.

(Oh, that's easy. But it involves you and this seems to be a family-oriented museum.)

I should have known. Let's sit by the bighorn sheep. I brought your letters.

(Question, Reg. Are you in fact making a scrapbook?)

No.

(Because I wouldn't put it past you.)

This one is written on the end papers of A Good Man is Hard to Find, a collection of short stories by Flannery O'Connor. The text has been extensively underlined and littered with marginalia.

(Some of that marginalia is pretty sexy.)

I know. And it has nothing to do with the book. 'I can still taste it.' 'I want some more, Reg.' Probably not Ms. O'Connor's intention when she wrote Good Country People.

.............................................................

_Day 3_

_E...merely writing the letter E is turning me on, E. Here, as requested, is my written narrative of last night's festivities, recounted in its barest psychoskeletal outline. I'm afraid this is the best my poor soul can muster this afternoon. One opportune side effect of our delicious new bond is the novel ease of sleeping in transit, and I am very sluggish indeed._

_After spending a whole day dwelling on every single thing you did and said, and yes, I do believe there was some kind of concert-thing in there too, I arrived at your door, which opened the instant my knuckle tapped on it. Without a word I fell to my knees and kissed you through your clothes, feeling you stir beneath my lips and glorying in my ability to make you hard this indirect way. We spent the better part of the night gorging on each other like insatiable, pearly-skinned vampires. I still can't bring myself to look at you for any amount of time today-I want it again and I want it too much. The more I suck you the newer it seems._

_At one point last night we did manage to have a conversation of sorts. You were saying something about the crowd, comparing them to an ocean, especially when they all start jumping. You're right, that's exactly what they become, this boiling sea. Every night I stand at the shore, gleefully dipping my toe in, while you stay beneath your umbrella, slathered in sunscreen, reading a book. Then you said maybe the crowd and our show were also like a single-celled organism, with me as the nucleus. I can't remember what you said you were. Ribosomes, or mitochondria, some cell word. I attacked you for the general cuteness of whatever it was and brutalized your earlobes, etc._

_You also talked about the faces of all those sweet girls, transforming into screaming St. Theresas as I pass them with my flaming arrow, piercing their hearts. 'If you would let them, they'd tear you limb from limb and lovingly devour you.'_

_Those beautiful girls... You asked, if things were very different...would I...do I ever think about it? Oh Edge. I'd take them seven at a time, love._

_You're turning me into this...this swooning voluptuary. OK, you're making it worse, then. Because of incidents like the following..._

_This morning, for the second time in as many days, you awakened me during the dim, pre-dawn hours. You were on top of me, counting my vertebrae or something. I turned my head to watch you, and before long I felt a gentle but insistent thrust between my legs. I gasped and you whispered, 'I will fuck you, baby, won't I?' Yes. 'Are you afraid it will hurt?' A little. 'But if I wanted to spread your legs like this and take you right now...' Please... '...you would let me because...' ...I belong to you, and it's your decision. 'And when will this happen?' Whenever you say._

_All of this in low murmurs...then you lifted my hair and kissed the back of my neck._

_B._

........................................................................

(We'd better move, Reg. The bighorn sheep were reading over your shoulder. The window is foggy, but I can see what's going on. Don't look now, but they are engaging in blatant frottage, thanks to you.)

You wrote the letter.

(And I want to see the big whale.)

OK. It's two rooms away.

(Looks like the museum store is doing a brisk business.)

I am not buying you anything.

(I want a stuffed animal. Something to keep me company during our infernal off-nights.)

Ehm...no.

('I belong to you, and it's your decision.' That kind of thing is fun during foreplay, but it's doing nothing for me in real life, sir.)

Here is your blue whale, B. Wow. It must be nearly one hundred feet long.

(Suspended from the ceiling, no less.)

Incredible.

(That weird little eye is highly disturbing.)

It's...below the mouth.

(Yeah.)

Strange.

(Anyway, back to me. To us, I mean. Where were we?)

Well, after that second night...

(Ugh. I had to 'earn' it.)

As I said before, it was going to be too easy for us. We needed a way to keep things... interesting. And you love to play games.

(Chess, yes. But no one is denied orgasms if they lose at chess.)

That's not a bad idea, you know. All I asked you to do was to let me know, preferably nonverbally, that you wanted it on any given night. And if you were especially creative in your request, I would indicate my approval with a wink.

(How anyone could successfully operate within such strict parameters is beyond me.)

You came on too strong in the beginning, pushing me into dark corners and shoving your tongue down my throat...but then you learned that a more subtle approach was more effective.

(Example.)

The four of us were at a bar in Toronto, and you lit one of your bizarre little cigars, remember?

(Plainly I was seeking the kind of oral gratification you were incapable of giving me.)

You looked right at me, deliberately shifted the cigar to your awkward left hand, and raised it to your lips. You closed your eyes and inhaled. That's all it took.

(And the moral of this story is: it's all about the left hand.)

Another afternoon at a sound check you made sure I was watching as you walked over to your microphone stand and knelt before it. Your left hand angled the microphone down to your lips as your right hand slid up and down the length of the stand. Gradually you stood, singing and lifting the mic back up to its original position, erect before your leering mouth. You raised an eyebrow and kissed the underside. I had to laugh at that.

(Oh--the chair!)

I was trying to read in my room and you collapsed into a nearby recliner that could rock back and forth. I didn't want to sit in it because it had an irritating metal-on-metal squeak. You noticed it too and sat still.

(And then a light bulb appeared in the thought balloon above my head.)

You began rocking, generating slow, drawn-out squeaking noises, and after a minute or two you increased your speed. I stopped reading and put my book down. You arched your back and extended your neck, creating an unmistakable rhythm with your chair as you sighed...

('Fuck me, Edge.')

You bit your lower lip and rocked violently about a dozen times. Then your body shuddered and you stopped.

('Edge...')

You exhaled audibly and pushed your hair back from your face. Your comedic timing flawless as ever, you paused, glanced up at me, and smiled...

('Good book, Reg?' If I were you, I would have fucked me right then and there.)

You are the id personified, sort of. But some of the things you do are so simple and moving that I feel actual physical pain. Once we were watching a thunderstorm from our hotel window, and you hummed a couple of old Elvis songs, _Love Me Tender_ and _Can't Help Falling in Love_. Your eyes enticed me to sing, and you took my hand at the appropriate time. It was a perfect moment.

(And now that last song is part of the set.)

It always gives me chills when you sing it. On the other hand, you continue to have no problem coming up with charmingly dirty ways to amuse me.

(And your guitars.)

You brought one into bed and laid it between us, saying...

('Wanna give us a little privacy, Edge?')

You obviously wanted me to watch you, so I pretended to be asleep, my eyes still partially open. Then the whispering began, in that flirtatious, incomprehensible language you employ when you're consumed with lust. You were speaking in tongues, but sexually, while your fingertips stroked the curves of my instrument. Soon you were on your hands and knees above it, licking and kissing the neck, periodically checking to make sure I was sleeping but not sleeping.

(That stunt bought me two nights in your bed.)

But every once in a while you or I were tired, or preoccupied, or otherwise busy, and we would spend those nights apart.

(Read the next letter, the one on silver wrapping paper.)

......................................................

_-Requested written account-_

_Good morning, love. You summoned me. You fucking summoned me, via Larry of all people, late last night and I was almost asleep. I heard a very loud knock and, 'B, Edge wants to see you.' I exhaled, rolled over, and...smiled._

_You greeted my tired eyes with a dry little chuckle. It didn't matter if I wanted it or not. What mattered was this: you wanted it. You placed your hands on my shoulders, and the second my knees hit the_  
_carpet it occurred to me that I had never been so turned on in all my life._

_B._

.......................................................

(For God's sake, Reg, why don't you go ahead and frame that one? You so enjoy the power trip.)

Actually, that's not the main reason why I've taken on this dominant role. Psychologically, it provides something so different for you it can't seem so much like...cheating. And I know you love it, B. My ego loves to watch you melt, to witness the things you will do for me. But more than anything else, this addictive feeling of power is eclipsed by my interest in experimenting with this unusual new creature only I can see. When I tell you what to do, it's as if I am stripping the petals off a flower, revealing the mysterious parts inside, both male and female.

(Like the orchids I sent you a few weeks ago...)

...for my birthday--one to save, and one for us to tear apart and examine.

(Torn with my teeth. Tell me, Reg. Are we ever going to leave this whale? That eye is seriously creepy.)

How does the Hall of Gems and Minerals sound?

(Expensive and fabulous.)

They have a giant emerald and a massive, 563-carat star sapphire, the largest in the world.

(Do you think the earth has been strip-mined of all its treasures or are there still more hiding?)

I think there's a lot going on beneath the surface that we'll never truly know.

(Oh my. I've fallen into a kaleidoscope of eye candy-all these sparkling colors...)

I knew you'd appreciate it.

(I appreciate you, Reg. Even when I'm sick.)

Like you were several months ago in Cleveland. You were so bossy and childish, suffering from some unspecified malaise. It was accompanied by a slightly sore throat, which you proclaimed 'an absolute goddamn travesty.' I assured you that you would indeed live to see another day, but you seemed to think you required round-the-clock nursing. I happened to have a thermometer, and I distinctly heard you mutter, 'You would have one, you freak.' Knowing that a substance akin to molten lava flows through your veins, it was difficult for me to tell if 100.6F was a fever or your body's normal temperature. You opened your cavernous mouth and I studied your throat--which I suppose seemed mildly irritated--and you laughed...

('Fuck it and make it better, Edge!')

So you were sick, but not too sick. I decided to take care of you. And there's a letter here about it, written on a page torn from a coloring book that I was going to give my daughter.

(I color much better than she does.)

............................................

_My poor Edge._

_It's official. You are a saint, and I apologize for everything. I was the apotheosis of idiocy, a demanding, infantile lunatic last night, and I'm sorry. Was it wrong for me to demand that you locate orange Popsicles and my 'special soup'? In Cleveland? Yes, it was. It was in fact pure evil. But you did it for me anyway and I love you._

_I love you for reading aloud from those children's science books you bought for Hollie--luna moths and meteorology and plate tectonics. That girl is going to be a genius like you someday._

_I love you for giving me a leisurely bath, shaving my face with your practiced hands, and slipping into bed beside me._

_I love you for reminding me not to talk, and when I whined about wanting to kiss you, Edge, you hypnotically described the ways you liked to be kissed and praised my tongue until we were both hard._

_I love you for taking me in your hand when I asked if a cold could be transmitted through oral sex. You said you didn't know, but you wanted to make me come--as long as I didn't scream and hurt my voice. I love you for going slow, for teasing me, for remembering what I taught you in that hotel room all those years ago. I love you for channeling my pleasure. Your moans were louder than any I've ever heard from you in the past._

_B._

...................................................

 

3: Pink.

(It looks like one of those cranes with a wrecking ball. Except there's no wrecking ball.)

Well said.

(OK, mister. What is this bony thing then?)

It is a barosaurus protecting her young from a predator. Beautiful space, too.

(If you like blimpless blimp hangars.)

Who doesn't?

(Reg, I'm hungry.)

Not possible.

(I distinctly remember seeing signs indicating the presence of a snack bar downstairs.)

We still need to see Vertebrate Origins.

(Snack bar.)

(Snack bar.)

(Snack bar.)

(Snack bar.)

Oh, all right.

(I love you, Reg! We can read 'Pink,' how about that? It's such an amusing stroll down memory lane...to your right, love.)

You have no sense of direction until food becomes part of the equation.

(Down these stairs.)

Hmm. They have Asian mammals on this floor.

(Through this umbilical passage. And...yes...snack bar...oh.)

The word 'desultory' springs to mind.

(Just get me some coffee and those cookies and park us in a corner, all right? And something salty.)

No problem.

(Check out the odd couple.)

What odd couple?

(They are ten feet away...old geezer and trophy wife at two o'clock. You should look at people more, Reg. They're terribly entertaining. All of this gazing at the sky and nature and  
architecture...honestly. It's called eye contact. You should try it.)

We'll see.

(Sure.)

................................................

(Ahh, that's it.)

Yes, your book. You took a small spiral notebook and filled it with an account of what we did on your birthday. The notebook is red, and you took an eraser or something and created a whitish--well, pinkish--title on the front cover.

('Pink.')

You set it up just like a novel, with a dedication page, an about-the-author page, and blurbs on the back cover.

(Who says there's no upside to insomnia? Read my blurbs.)

...............................................

_Praise for 'Pink', a short story by Bono._

_"This kind of dominance/submission is sexy because it's intimate, it's trusting, and it's incredibly loving. And that's just sexy no matter how you slice it."-Larry Mullen, Jr._

_"You see, there is something so wrong with you, in the most delicious and twisted way possible."-Adam Clayton._

_"You just reach in and grab us by the sexy place and give a gentle twist."-Paul McGuinness._

_"You make my jaw drop."-The Edge_

...............................................

(Indeed I do. Heh.)

That's enough.

...............................................

_Pink._

_A short story by Bono._

_*_

_Text copyright 1992 by Bono._

_Grateful acknowledgement is made to EMI Publications for use of "China Girl" by David Bowie and Iggy Pop, 1983; Screen Gems EMI Music, Inc. for use of "(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman" by Carole King, 1971; Warner Bros. for use of "Lola" by Ray Davies, 1970. Warner Bros., or rather, Prince refused to grant me permission to use "Darling Nikki," but he's been out to get me since 1988, and I am using it anyway just to spite him._

_Printed (very neatly) in Belgium._

_First and only edition._

_*_

_Dedicated to the undisputed majesty that is The Edge._

_*_

_Pink._

_*_

_Edge, you did not ask for one, but I want to write a complete narrative of the events of May 10, 1992 (yesterday), because it was special. It...changed me, and it was in my opinion a significant event in my life. Please do not think this is typical Bono hyperbole. I love you, and without you none of this would have been possible. Thank you, Edge._

_Following a night of drunken revelry in Lyon with the entire organization, my birthday began with an extended call from dear Ali. I forced her to open a bottle of champagne and eat a multitude of strawberries so we could enjoy the same breakfast over the phone. You must have left our bed long before I was awake, and you remained conspicuously absent during the morning as I exchanged pleasantries with a swarm of well-wishers. I was very happy, as this kind of silence could only mean that you were up to something. When I saw you in the lobby you looked noticeably furtive and crafty. And now that I think about it, as we left the hotel you held the door for me. Yes, that was the tip-off._

_We were to arrive in Ghent, Belgium, later that afternoon. You and I boarded the plane long before anyone else--something you manipulated that went right over my head at the time. When I was in my seat you kissed my ear--bold!--and whispered surreptitiously, 'I adore you, Bono.' One hand wandered while the other slipped a small package into my jacket. I thanked you and received a wink. Included with the gift was a note that said, 'I want you to take this into the bathroom. You can open it there. Incidentally, this morning as you slept you were delectably erect, birthday boy.' I looked at you across the aisle. You were captivated by the upholstery of the seat in front of you._

_I took it back to the area of the plane I normally take great pains to avoid and locked myself in. The package was lightweight and felt nearly empty. I tore into it. Inside was something black. Lace? It was hiding beneath another note: 'Put it on, love, and wear it under your clothes today.' Excuse me?_

_I lifted it out of the box and concluded that it was a garter belt. No stockings, just a belt with four attached garters. I slowly shook my head and chuckled. Oh Edge. I've seen Bull Durham, too. I held it in my hands as if it were something completely alien, examining it ineptly. It seemed to hook in the back like a bra. Examining mutated into fondling; it was a lovely thing, so delicate. The novelty, the audacity of your plan was turning me on. This inconspicuous feminization was undeniably a test and a secret we could share. Why not? I gamely put it on, feeling a bit ridiculous and completely subversive. The lace clung to my skin and the garters tickled my thighs in a way that would constantly remind me of the belt's presence. I took a deep breath in anticipation of the (undoubted) daylong mind-fuck to come. Thankful that the mirror was not full length, I stole a fleeting look. It was written all over my face._

_I returned to my seat and received a sidelong glance from a certain guitarist, who immediately looked out the window the instant we made eye contact. Even though I could only see the back of your head, I knew without question that you were smiling, possibly laughing, and trying to compose yourself. You returned your attention to me and failed miserably in your attempt to look suave, bursting into a big smile, rubbing your right shoulder._

_'Problem, Edge?'_

_'Oh, I'm good,' you said, grinning at your armrest._

_'No, Edge. You're bad. So very, very bad.'_

_You shot me a little nod of acknowledgement accompanied by what can only be described as the look of love. You placed your hand over your heart, making a small fluttery movement. I retaliated by puckering my lips, and I reached below the waistband of my pants and produced an audible snap of the belt. You blushed and pretended to be very interested in a magazine. Ahh yes. Read those little articles, Edge._

_The others began to board. Some of the female staff members came over to wish me a happy birthday, offering kisses, cards, and candy. One asked me, 'How does it feel to be turning thirty-two?'_

_I replied, 'I feel pretty, love.'_

_We both remained poker-faced for the duration of the flight. The presence of the belt was a little uncomfortable, but it was a good kind of uncomfortable._

_After about ninety minutes of silently stewing in our own juices, we landed in Ghent. You looked at me and mouthed, 'Stay.' We waited until everyone else had exited. You came over to my seat, took my hand, and sort of helped me up. 'Oh, I understand,' I said quietly as you held my jacket. I slipped my arms inside the sleeves and turned to face you. Your hands tipped my head back and before long I was being skillfully kissed._

_'There's more,' you told me. 'And I want you to take a nap once we get to the hotel, Bono.'_

_And what a hotel it was. My room was laughably over-the-top, a gaudy abomination I took a shine to right away. The walls, curtains, bedspread, carpeting, and upholstery were in various lurid shades of red, and every other available surface was either gilded or mirrored. 'Reg,' I called to you across the hall, 'I'm standing inside a box of Valentine's Day chocolates!"_

_You emerged from your room, your face arranged into an expression of disbelief and pure horror. I bounded over to investigate. We stood together in silence for several seconds, taking it all in, and then I began to sing, 'I knew a girl named Nikki, I guess you could say she was a sex fiend...' Laughing like a maniac, I gave you some time to be alone with your thoughts in your catastrophically purple room._

_Soon the flowers began to arrive. An elderly chambermaid with saturnine features entered my room with an assortment of crystal vases containing pink peonies. Thirty-two pink peonies, to be exact, and she regarded me with withering neutrality as I surrendered a rather lavish amount of currency du jour._

_Pink. Well, that seemed just about right, and your note merely confirmed it. 'You are beautiful. E.' The flowers were heavy and sumptuous, and the stems were slightly bent, as if each bloom was rather bashful about its own burdensome extravagance._

_I opened a window, and a mild spring breeze with only a hint of diesel exhaust floated in, mingling with the heady scent of the flowers and circulating it throughout the room. I stretched out on the bed and continued to gape at the insane amount of redness, fingering the tiny black bow at the center of the garter belt. I drifted off to sleep._

_...Only to be awakened a half hour later by the kind of ham-fisted door pounding that is Larry's calling card. 'What the hell, Larry?' I shouted, opening the door. A certain gray eminence scowled at me and shoved a package into my hands. She stomped across the room, slammed my window shut, and returned to the doorway, tapping her foot impatiently. I handed over another wad of money in penitence and sat down to open the gift._

_Since when did you know I had wanted a new black shirt? I took it out of the box and held it up to the light...lace, Reg? Chanel, Reg? The typically verbose note: 'Wear this tonight.'_

_Flushed, bemused, and slightly giddy, I returned to bed with the silky thing--let's call it what it really is and say it's a blouse--and wondered how it would feel draped over my bare skin._

_How in God's name was I supposed to sleep? I found a book and looked at words for a while. I might as well have been reading Sanskrit._

_Again with the pounding...I wish you could have seen this woman--straight out of David Lynch. 'I sort of love her,' I thought when I saw her churlish grimace. She sighed disgustedly and proffered a box so small I was a little embarrassed for both of us. I gave her the rest of my money, a paltry sum to be sure, and impulsively bent down to kiss her cheek. A sharp, appalled noise escaped her lips and away she stormed. Historians take note: the one woman in the world immune to my lethal charm is living in Ghent, Belgium._

_I'm afraid I will have to deduct a couple of originality points from your final score, love. Chanel blouse and now a miniature red Chanel lipstick and Chanel No.5 in the tiniest bottle imaginable--convenient one-stop shopping, eh, Reg? I suppose you purchased the garter belt there as well. So that's what you were doing a few days ago in Paris..._

_Your note: 'I'll be there in an hour.'_

 

4: Pinker.

......................................

Looking back, this whole concept could have easily backfired.

(Maybe so if you would have tried it five years ago, but not now. I'm much more open to experimentation.)

You love women.

(All the more reason for me to want to be one...for you.)

You were perfect.

(I didn't even have to wear a dress.)

You were perfect, baby.

(So were you, going out and finding luxurious things for us to eat, even wedding cake.)

There was a reception in a small ballroom downstairs. I could hear _With or Without You_ throbbing out into the lobby. I couldn't resist taking a look inside; the bride and groom were dancing.

(Why do people always miss the point of that song?)

I don't think even you know what that song is about.

(Still. It's inappropriate for a bride and groom on their wedding night. Be that as it may...)

A relative of the groom saw me standing there and asked if I was a friend of the bride. I said I didn't know the couple at all, but I did play guitar on the song they were dancing to. 'Is that a fact?' he asked. 'Could you stay here for a minute?' Before I knew it the happy pair was shaking my hand, very excited, clearly fans. The bride, who seemed to be a sort of spokesperson for the couple, was overflowing with inarticulate, gushing praise. She explained that they were going to see our concert the following night as part of their honeymoon, and they had in fact scheduled the whole wedding around it. I was genuinely flattered and gave them my congratulations. They invited me, invited the entire band to their reception, but I told them Adam and Larry were long gone and...I thought maybe you had plans as well. They noticed my sack of groceries and asked if I'd at least like some cake and a bottle of champagne. Knowing your sweet tooth...

(And knowing my champagne tooth...)

How could I refuse?

..................................................

_To a man getting ready for an...event?, an hour seems like an eternity. A woman, on the other hand, requires the lion's share of an afternoon. I took a shower and shaved in the blood red bathroom and suddenly found I still had plenty of work to do. At least I had an idea of what I was going to wear: everything you gave me plus my leather pants. I know you like the way they cling to me, and if you would look carefully you'd be able to see a faint suggestion of the garters underneath. And carefully is the only way you ever look at anything, Edge. The shirt felt opulently divine, and I suffered a bitter pang of envy for all the women who could afford to swathe themselves in sensual fabrics every day of their lives. The lace pattern was sheer enough to reveal certain features of my chest, arms, and back, and opaque enough to conceal others, creating a feeling of ambiguity that would set the tone for the night._

_There was nothing ambiguous about the perfume, which was quintessentially feminine, powdery and floral. I remembered an advertisement I'd seen a few years ago, where a woman of a certain age was advising her ingenue companion to apply perfume 'wherever you want him to kiss you.' Needless to say, this advice was no help at all. I did what I could to narrow things down. I decorated my lips for you, hoping the end result wouldn't look too girlish, or worse, clownish, but given my surroundings the effect was...positively decadent, borderline satanic, even. It seemed a shame that my careful artistry would soon be kissed away, but that's probably the whole point of lipstick, now, isn't it?_

_Some university should award you an honorary doctorate for your pioneering work in the field of anticipatory sexual tension. As the time of your arrival drew closer, I couldn't decide where to sit, and I couldn't stop gazing at my reflection. I must say the bathroom lighting was beyond reproach. It created a mirror setup that was diagnostically acute without being brutal, assuring a certain vainglorious pop star that aesthetically things were looking very good indeed._

_I unlocked my door and stood by the window, watching a sunset that looked computer-enhanced. I really should stop biting my nails, I thought. I was just about to make a resolution I had no intention of keeping when I heard your knock, one medium beat followed by two softer ones._

_'Come inside, Edge,' I called._

..............................................

(I was perfect, wasn't I?)

Baby, when I saw you...

...............................................

_'Don't just do something; stand there, Edge,' I teased, turning from the window and crossing the room. I took your sack of whatever it was and placed it on a table. 'Let me help you with this,' I continued, pulling off your jacket. 'My, don't you look devastatingly handsome tonight?' All black again--minimalism is your best look. You bent to kiss my mouth, but I turned my face to the side at the last second and your lips landed on my cheek. No use ruining my lipstick this early in the game, I reasoned._

_'Happy birthday, love.'_

_'Thank you, sirrr,' I murmured back. You studied me, your hand gently tormenting a nipple hiding beneath the lace. 'I love it,' I said._

_'Are you hungry, baby?'_

_'Ravenous.'_

_'Let's--Christ, I can't take my eyes off you--let's sit down.' We walked over to the table. I couldn't believe what I was seeing: you pulled my chair out for me. Such a minor action, but--_

_'Oh, Edge.'_

_We sat and you unloaded your sack; its contents were an amusing variety of produce, guilty-pleasure snack items, gourmet delicacies in ostentatious little jars, a rather phallic-looking loaf of bread, some kind of cheese I'd never seen before. Cake. Champagne. Several mystery items remained inside the sack._

_'Champagne!' I exclaimed. 'I think there are a couple of glasses in the bathroom.' I went to retrieve them and gave my reflection its fifth double-take of the night. You stood when I came back to the table._

_Lacking utensils of any kind, we fed each other with our bare hands, tearing the bread into crusty fragments, violating innocent peaches, and engaging in torrid displays of finger sucking and other sybaritic behavior. By dessert the table was a crime scene, and I for one did not want to be around the next day as my morose and condemnatory new sweetheart cleaned up the wreckage. I reached for the cake._

_'That is wedding cake,' you said and explained its origins._

_'There's only one way to eat this,' I remarked, insinuating a large portion into your mouth. You copied the gesture, which was followed by that pleasingly stupid bride-and-groom-mutual-champagne-drinking maneuver._

_'I can only imagine what the bridal suite of this hotel looks like,' you laughed. 'They're truly missing out if their walls aren't painted whorehouse red like these are,' I said._

_You touched my face and soon I was under the microscope of your gaze. We were silent for a moment. 'I can't get over it,' you said softly. I kissed your wrist, leaving a faint red imprint behind._

_'What can I say, Reg? You make me feel like a natural woman.'_

_'More like Lola-l-o-l-a, Lola.'_

_'Well, you're not the world's most passionate guy.'_

_'Very funny. No. With the red lips and pale skin you're more of a devilish...geisha.'_

_'I love it!' I announced. Inspired, I moved to sit on your lap and placed my arms around your neck, singing, 'My little China girl...you shouldn't mess with me...I'll ruin everything you are...'_

_On cue, you purred, 'Oh baby, just you shut your mouth.'_

_We kissed--a long, dreamlike, color-annihilating sequence that left me breathless and dazed. A barely perceptible penumbra of red surrounded your mouth and I'm certain mine as well. Reaching into_ _your shopping bag, you located yet another box for me to open._

_'Edge, I'm...you've already given me so much today.'_

_'And I haven't been around to see you open any of it.'_

_I certainly didn't need to be asked twice to open a present. A hinged, rectangular box... must be jewelry... a necklace... diamonds!... with a slightly tarnished patina that could only mean one_ _thing...antique diamonds._

_'It's been in my family for decades.'_

_'Oh God, Edge, no...'_

_'I'm supposed to give it to someone I love very much.'_

_'I am speechless.'_

_'There's a first time for everything, love.'_

_You fastened the clasp, and I could hear a series of tiny clicks as your fingernail journeyed down the surface of the necklace. I waited until your eyes returned to mine._

_'I love you.'_

_I stood beside our bed and dimmed the lights, and in doing so the peonies seemed a bit more fragrant, the room a bit warmer, my breathing a bit faster. You joined me and we wilted onto the bed, your tentative hands gradually stripping me while you remained fully-clothed as usual. You paused every now and then as if to ask, 'Are you sure this is what you really want, darling?' You fondled and sucked my nipples for what seemed like an inordinate amount of time. I stroked your hair and watched you, cooing sweet phrases, quietly observing how hard you were becoming. I did my best to act atypically demure. By the time you had taken off everything except the necklace and garter belt, I was feeling that way in earnest._

_'So romantic tonight, Edge,' I sighed. 'I want to suck you.'_

_You pulled your shirt over your head, saying, 'Not yet. You will be first.' I smiled. Within this womblike atmosphere of indulgence, you were going to make love to me as if I were a woman. Beyond the obvious kinky enjoyment such an endeavor would provide, it afforded a view to a side of you I'd never been able to see before. And there would be no jealousy involved because I would be the recipient of your attention._

_Yes, and I could see how women would adore you...so thorough, so patient, a thoughtful man with all the time in the world to please them. You lingered over my neck, your fingers lost in my hair. You kissed places that did not necessarily require kissing--forearms, hipbones, shins--whispering endearing observations along the way. I had no idea how long this process lasted: fifteen minutes, possibly an hour, a week? All I knew was that a coil inside my body was being wound tighter and tighter whenever you bit my lower lip or inhaled my perfume. And I knew that you were naked._

_You let me climb on top for a while. How would a woman kiss you, Edge? She would kiss the parts of your face she loves. She would lower her head so she could drag her hair down your chest. Her fingers would be adorably ignorant and infuriatingly subtle with your erection. She would whisper, 'Show me what to do, Edge,' until you'd place your hand over hers, teaching her how you like to be touched. She would be a gifted student, so much so that you would ask her to lie face down on the bed. She would gasp as you unhooked her garter belt and shudder as you refastened it so it was even tighter than before, further defining her waist. She would secretly smile as you kissed her above and below her belt and arranged the garters just so. She would blush when you said, 'The belt suits you; this has always been so girlish,' patting her rump appreciatively. She would squirm when she heard you say..._

_'I have a toy for you, Bono.'_

_You retrieved your sack and rolled me over. A pillow was placed beneath my hips, and you proceeded to lick me. You concentrated your attention on the tip until my writhing compelled you to take more, suck harder. Once I was in your mouth I felt content at last, relieved, safe even. It would be soon. I relaxed and savored each sensation as it washed over my body until...you stopped. 'Edge,' I whimpered, playing the coveted role of the spoiled boyfriend, sadly forced to have his balls licked as he fondled his diamonds and wondered about the implications of his new toy. Poor baby. My hips bucked involuntarily, and I'm fairly certain I cried out when your mouth engulfed me once again._

............................................

What I knew about anal sex up until that point could have been inscribed upon a bottle cap with a very dull magic marker.

(But you, my love, had done your homework.)

And I was pleased to learn that it is an act most couples warm up to gradually.

(Allowing you more opportunities to tease me in new, progressively challenging ways.)

You've loved every second of it.

(Yes, Reg, I have.)

............................................

_You crawled up to receive feverish kisses and praise and dear God get back down there now Edge. 'If you insist,' you said casually and returned to the task at hand. At mouth. I saw you reach for...whatever it was you were reaching for. You parted my legs and spread something warm and slippery and heavenly all over me. Then I heard you say, 'Oh baby, you're so wet.'_

_I think my central nervous system shut down at that point._

_'Would you like to play with your new toy?'_

_The backup system kicked in. 'Please, Edge, anything.'_

_'Don't you want to see it first?'_

_It was as if some kind of genius voice was telling you exactly what to say to me..._

_'Yes.'_

_You showed me something smooth and somewhat rocket-shaped and much smaller than you, I might add._

_'Would you like me to fuck you with this, baby?'_

_'Oh Edge...'_

_'Because I won't do it if you don't want me to.'_

_'Fuck...'_

_'Say it.'_

_'Fuck me, Edge. Please...fuck me like a girl.'_

_'Yes, darling, of course. I need you to relax now, and just breathe.'_

_Such infinite tenderness; you stimulated me with your fingers, which moved in repetitive little circles for quite some time, before, yes, I felt the initial penetration. 'Relax, love,' you said as a sort of mantra the entire time. And because of you I was relaxed and it didn't hurt...all I felt was a sort of fullness and an alluring helplessness. Any movement you made was measured and steady and right._

_'I...oh my God..."_

_'Breathe...that's good.' You reached a spot that made legitimate speech beyond my reach. I communicated via a series of whimpers and sighs and...variety sounds. 'This is only the beginning,' I heard you say. 'It may take a while before you're prepared to accept...me.' What could I possibly say to that? You continued your calm manipulations as you took me in your mouth again, and the additional pleasure caused my cries to become truly shameless. It was rapidly becoming more than I could take. I felt a tug on a garter, and this reminder that I was still a girl...that did it. Once I regained consciousness some time later, you clinically explained that the nerve pathway from the penis to the brain runs through the rectum, and a rather large nerve bundle is located beneath the prostate. Thank you, Dr. Edge. All I knew was I felt the orgasm in my very toenails and I was blatantly crying--actual tears in my eyes--when the white light hit me. This was followed by a languid coda of kisses and slow caresses. I felt drugged and tranquil, but eventually it dawned upon me that it just might be your turn. I moved down and had every intention of rewarding you prolifically, but you said no. The night was exclusively mine, although the morning would probably be another story. Another story for another spiral notebook, Edge._

_End._

_*_

_About the author._

_Bono is the singer for U2, an Irish rock band of some note. His plans for global domination are finally coming to pass. This is his first erotic short story, which is a work of non-fiction. Bono lives with his wife Ali and their two children in Dublin, Ireland, and he lives with his husband The Edge in every major city in the entire world. By the way, he loves you very much, Edge._

..............................

(I do, you know.)

Yes.

(It's going to be all right.)


	2. Watch/Gold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now our story takes a darker turn...
> 
> I forgot to say this last time: Closest has shifting viewpoints. This chapter is Edge's, and next time we'll switch to Bono, who will take us through the rest of the story.
> 
> I love you for reading this.

5: Watch.

(Bored.)

I can't take you anywhere these days.

(You have very little say in the matter.)

Didn't you enjoy the Cape York meteorite?

(Yes.)

It's not every day you get to touch something 4.5 billion years old.

(A red hot shooting star crashing into placid, unsuspecting Greenland, changing its terrain forever...I think that's kind of poetic, don't you Reg?)

Yes. It is.

(Tell me, is there an outside chance I might get to see a diorama featuring a small population of cannibals?)

I don't think so.

(Then let's get out of here. Can we be done now?)

It is getting crowded.

(All kinds of people running around without any discernible agenda, women who sort of scream before they laugh, men who look like they are smoking cigars even when they're not...it's a veritable greatest hits of people who annoy you, Reg.)

We still have a couple of hours before I leave to meet you at La Guardia.

(The Park! Take me to the park. The weather's not so bad.)

.........................................................

(You bought a newspaper? I do not want to know what's going on in the world today. I really don't. And look: here's yet another sorry attempt at reproducing a full-color photograph. Why do newspapers even try? They always fail. The color separation is off just enough to put my teeth on edge.)

Heh.

(You wish.)

You're forgetting. That woman said the interview would be in today's edition.

(Oh. Of course! You'd better go back and buy several copies then.)

Why?

(There might be photos of me.)

One newspaper is quite enough.

(Think about the scrapbook...)

There is no scrapbook.

(But what will we show our grandchildren?)

I'm sure they'll get a kick out of all your letters.

(Do you have more with you?)

I have the one from a couple of days ago. The letter about the movie?

(Good, read that one to me. Where are we going to sit? Look at all those lovely people sunbathing out there on the Great Lawn.)

We're sitting under this tree.

(Agoraphobia, anyone?)

I already have plenty, thanks. This letter was written on the back of a flier for a new exhibit at Ameringer Howard, the same gallery that showed Anton's photographs. Looks like...artfully arranged piles of dirt on the floor.

(That artist had a tough act to follow. After the guy saw those photos of me, he must have thought, 'I might as well give up now.' He tossed out twenty pounds of dirt and said to hell with it.)

Yeah, that's exactly what he says here in his artist's statement.

.......................................................................

_August 29_

_Requested written description of last night._

_Edge, love. Have I told you lately how marvelous it is to be back on the road with you? Of course I have, many times. The month off in July never seemed to end, did it? It feels so good to be back in New York, the city where giant steps are taken. It will be soon, won't it?_

_Tonight and the next night we will play Yankee Stadium. You, my serene, long-suffering Edge, have been forced to listen to my nonstop chatter regarding Lou Reed, the taping, the historic nature of us playing this venue...oh how I do love to talk. I thought it was sweet at the time, but now that I think about it, you took me to the art theater across the street from the Plaza to shut me up._ _Not that it worked. We were there to see 'Like Water for Chocolate,' a foreign film concerning a young Mexican woman's tortured life, her forbidden lover, and the sensual power of food. I think. I was not in the mood to read subtitles, and to make matters worse the theater was so highbrow they did not sell candy of any kind. They could have made a killing on chocolate alone. Buffoons._

_We were seated in the back row, although that particular crowd of gray-hairs would not have recognized us anyway. As the lights went down, I took your hand and played with it as if it were an especially charming little animal. Then it became a map of your body: the thumb was your head, the other fingers were arms and legs, and the palm was your torso. You were wholly unaware that I was violating you, voodoo style, using your hand as a conduit. When this avenue of foreplay was thoroughly exhausted, I looked down at the sloping aisle, outlined by a border of tiny red lights. Then I saw us on the floor next to those lights, and you were fucking me, the angle of the aisle and gravity causing you to drive deeper, harder. I was clutching your back, holding on for dear life there in the semi-darkness. My hand traveled up your leg as I whispered, 'Edge , let's go back to my room.'_

_'Why?'_

_'I need it so badly.'_

_'I'm trying to watch this.'_

_'Don't you want to fuck me?'_

_'Of course I do. But you can wait. I paid twenty dollars for these seats.'_

_Mind-boggling! I sulked for the duration of the film, muttering pithy and quotable observations about its lackluster production values and mimicking the heroine's every Spanish groan._ _After the movie was over and I had been plied with not unacceptable chocolate, I shamelessly begged you to take me on my bedroom floor in the dim glow of a nightlight. I nearly had you convinced when the telephone rang. Paul had some kind of non-crisis on his hands and had been trying to reach us all night. We kissed ardently as we dressed each other._

_And I still want it. And I will get it._

_B._

................................................................

(And I will get it tonight.)

Ninety percent.

(I'm making headway, then.)

Let's see. Here it is.

(The interview! Nice brains-of-the-operation photo, Edge. I could sharpen knives on those cheekbones. Did they use a bad pun in the title? Yes, of course they did. But where am I? Oh. Well that's simply scandalous. Not only is the picture of me outdated and small, they've also reversed it to enhance the layout, I suppose. Everyone knows the good freckles are on the left side of my face, and my chin skews ever so slightly to the right. This doesn't resemble me at all. What will our fans think?)

I'm sure hundreds of strongly worded letters to the editor are being composed right now.

(Hmph.)

Shall I read it?

(If you must, but now I'm taking everything she says with a grain of salt. This woman has officially thrown all credibility out the window.)

...................................................................

_The Edge of Sanity_

_U2's Guitarist Discusses Zoo TV and Energy Siphoning_

_By Lisa Phipps_

_New York City (AP) It's always the quiet ones. The Edge (born David Evans, 1961), guitarist for rock supergroup U2, sits across from me in the corner of a rowdy Irish pub, his eyes sparkling impishly. I have been granted a brief audience with this man, whose slight build and conspicuous intelligence do not prepare me for his idiosyncratic sense of humor. Not five minutes have passed since our initial handshake, but already he has stolen my drink and delivered an uproarious but sadly unprintable joke._

_The band is celebrating what was by all accounts a triumphant performance at Yankee Stadium, which they hope to repeat Sunday night as part of the Outside Broadcast leg of the Zoo TV tour. U2 are the second rock act ever to play at this stadium, the first being Billy Joel._

_"Forgive me if I seem distracted," Edge apologizes, eyeing a nearby table where the rest of his bandmates (Bono, Adam Clayton, and Larry Mullen, Jr.) sit. A mixture of laughter, alcohol, and boyish horseplay dominates the scene, and the elegantly bookish guitarist monitors the proceedings with obvious affection and quiet concern. "It's usually my job to be the designated conscience of the band on nights like this," he explains, flashing a rare and disarming smile._

_During the course of the following interview, the soft-spoken father of three steals numerous glances at his companions, particularly Bono (left), the band's singer and regular mouthpiece. Onstage the mercurial Bono finds a dramatic foil in his more subdued guitarist, and the two manage to create an indescribable dynamic that has the ability to captivate an entire stadium of fans. In the setting of the pub, however, it is Bono who is uncharacteristically gloomy and somewhat agitated. He rubs his neck and stares at Edge with a palpable concentration._

_Q: Your singer seems exhausted...and a little wired._

_A: Performances like the one tonight are especially grueling for Bono. He has always felt driven to charm every last audience member, and when you're talking about an entire stadium--it absolutely_ _depletes him sometimes. The double-life he leads also takes its toll..._

_Q: Double life?_

_A: He has this family here on tour, but he also has his own family back in Dublin. He can't be with one without pining for the other. Bono wants to have it all. As a matter of fact, he is flying back to see his wife and daughters tomorrow night._

_Q: How romantic._

_A: He and Ali are very much in love._

_Q: Do I detect a hint of melancholy in your voice?_

_A: [pause] It's no secret that the last couple of years have been difficult for me due to the dissolution of my own marriage._

_Q: I understand. But I'm certain you boys have no trouble meeting women. You're all awfully attractive. Are you open to the idea of starting a new relationship?_

_A: [wicked smile] What exactly did you have in mind?_

_Q: I didn't mean..._

_A: Oh yes you did._

_Q: You Irishmen are all the same._

_A: Not exactly... [laughs]_

_There is a thunderous crash behind me, and I turn to watch the band's singer storming away, leaving an overturned chair in his wake. Edge rolls his eyes, holding his head in his hands._

_Q: Is he OK?_

_A: He'll be back [glances at peculiar calculator watch, pushes several buttons] in about ninety seconds._

_Q: You know Bono that comprehensively?_

_A: We've always been close._

_Q: What could he tell us about you that we don't already know?_

_A: Don't get him started. Repeat, do not get him started._

_Q: It sounds like he knows some juicy secrets._

_A: You have no idea._

_Q: Has he ever crossed the line and told interviewers things you didn't want him to say?_

_A: With alarming regularity._

_Q: That must be exasperating._

_A: With Bono one has to take the good with the bad._

_Q: Describe the good._

_A: [long pause] He is the most passionate person I've ever known. There is no off switch. All of his senses are somehow heightened, beyond the grasp of normal people. He is capable of suffering great despair, but he can also feel a level of joy I know I'll never quite understand. He lives each day as if it were his last...or his first. [watch produces a series of high-pitched beeps] And here he comes now._

_With a sharp smack, Bono's hand falls on Edge's right shoulder. "Would you mind terribly if I stole Edge from you for just a moment," he purrs seductively, more of a statement than a question, his magnetic eyes redefining the color blue. He smiles, and I am prepared to hand over Edge and my firstborn son to this man. Edge scowls at his friend, however; the two engage in a championship-level staring match._

_"Three minutes," the guitarist says calmly._

_"Time it," Bono retorts. Edge employs his watch again as Bono picks up his chair and settles beside a rather smug-looking Adam Clayton. Bono will spend the rest of the interview deliberately glaring at me. The experience is completely unsettling._

_Q: What's it like to mount a tour this extensive?_

_A: As nerve-wracking and tiring as it is, I love it. Any teenager who picks up a guitar dreams about what I have the privilege of doing night in, night out. Our fans have given us this incredible life. At_ _times being on tour is a bit like running for office, and guess who wants to be president?_

_Q: What do you think about interviews?_

_A: With reporters you always have to act as if it's the first time you've ever told a particular anecdote. That last answer--I think I've said that to a dozen other people this year. Sorry._

_Q: Apology accepted. Do you have any fresh material you'd like to try out on me?_

_A: Let's see. New material...this occurred to me tonight. Bono is completely unallergic to gazes. He's staring at you right now, isn't he?_

_Q: Yes._

_A: Stare back. Go ahead._

_Q: Well...all right. OK, I'm staring._

_A: He's not looking away, is he?_

_Q: No. It's like he's siphoning my energy through my eyes._

_A: That is the way he operates when he's onstage. He doesn't fear attention; he feeds off it. I've never seen anything quite like it._

_Q: And what about you, The Edge? What gives you the nerve to perform in front of all those people?_

_A: My guitar. When I hold a guitar I feel like I'm...home. The connection we share as a band, where no one component is more important than the whole...that helps. And Bono. I truly could not do this_ _without him. I give him a platform, but at the same time he carries me._

_Edge grins at his surly friend, whose expression softens a bit. "He knows when I'm talking about him, and he knows when it's good," the guitarist says, straightening his omnipresent black cap. His beeping watch signals that my work here is done, and I get up to leave. "I learned this move from Bono," he remarks, taking my hand and kissing it. "It virtually guarantees a positive story."_

_I take a few steps and look back at the band, all of whom are raising their mugs to me, except for Bono, who stares at me victoriously as he slowly drains his glass._

.......................................................

(That's just great. So now I'm psychotic.)

 

6: Gold.

(Did you hear me, Edge? I said, 'So now I'm psychotic.')

You sure did.

(And...?)

You'll get no argument from me.

(Meanwhile, you emerged from this interview smelling like a rose, a peony even.)

I believe it's called 'basic human decency.'

(No Reg, it's called 'basic human sluttiness.')

Oh for God's sake.

(Did you or did you not smile at her--warmly--when she touched your hand for no good reason?)

I did.

(Her eyes were what color?)

Green. If you must know.

(See, not only did you notice, you remembered. As a matter of fact, you were looking at her far more than you were looking at me!)

How outrageous of me.

(Indeed!)

You're so pretty when you're jealous.

(I know, I know...but that still doesn't make it right. I am not used to this kind of thing, and I'm still traumatized if you want to know the truth.)

Want me to talk you through it?

(I think you'd better. Tell me what we did after she left.)

Well, maybe we should back up a bit. The two of us were fully expecting to spend a momentous night together.

(You were going to give me...)

...something you've been needing for months.

(Months.)

And then, just as we were about to leave the stadium, you received a telephone call.

(Ali.)

And you know the rest. You told her you would fly back to see her the next night...kind of spoiled our moment, didn't it? I must confess that a lot of my dark feelings surfaced. And yes, that reporter came in handy.

(I suppose she may have been relatively beautiful.)

You suppose...but in the end all we did was talk about you, or didn't you notice?

(Yes Edge. I did.)

Your behavior was atrocious. She downplayed it considerably in my opinion, and after she left, you followed me into the bathroom.

(I certainly did.)

You pushed me up against one of the stalls, your low voice declaring...

('You were blatantly trying to make me jealous, Edge.')

I didn't know whether to slap you or kiss you. I caught you roughly by your neck and shoulder. Soon I had you pinned to the wall, and I told you...

(..you snarled, actually..)

... 'You don't know the first thing about jealousy, Bono.' You licked your parted lips and closed your eyes. Your body seemed to liquefy beneath my fingers as you exhaled, your breath sultry against my neck. I had to kiss you. I couldn't stop myself. My lips silently accused yours of unspeakable crimes, while your lips mutely repented and begged for leniency.

('Teach me, Edge.')

I told you to wait for me in the car. I walked back to Larry and Adam's table and shook my head, executing my now-patented 'I don't know what the fuck is wrong with him now' gesture. Adam sneered; Larry rolled his eyes. I think I can get away with this kind of evasion possibly two more times in the future, at which point it will be your turn to make excuses for us.

(I think it's cute how you assume they are oblivious. Because they are not.)

What makes you so sure?

(Come on, Reg. You don't even have to tell us when you've bought a new guitar. We all just know. We've been together that long and we know each other that exhaustively.)

This is something I would rather not think about right now.

(They're fine with it.)

You would say that.

(Anyway. I was your wayward boy, waiting for you in the car.)

When I sat beside you, it was implicit that there would be no talking. I looked out the window and counted your corrupted objects: impractical shoes, magazines, ice cream, Chanel, diamonds, chandeliers, sunglasses, lingerie, television, smoke. Red. Blue. Black. Pink. Four colors forever yours. I could hear your boots bumping against each other. I could smell you, love: leather, sweat, alcohol, and sugar. I could feel your eyes investigating my armor, gently tapping away, hunting for vulnerable fissures. I wondered how you could sit there doing nothing and still manage to save rock and roll, advise the Pope, control the weather, keep the planets spinning, et cetera.

We stood in opposite corners of the elevator, breathing and staring. While neither of us moved a muscle, we were clearly circling each other, and I could feel it in the very ions of that small, enclosed space: lust, envy, avarice. After two tries you still couldn't open your door. I grabbed the plastic key from your hand, turned it over, and easily succeeded. I followed you inside and shut the door.

(You slammed it, Edge.)

I guess I did.

(Totally on purpose.)

You shivered and looked at me. I crossed my arms and stared back with narrowed eyes. You fell to your knees in the darkness, and again you whispered...

('Teach me, Edge.')

Baby...

(Mmm.)

'Lie down,' I told you, and soon I was crawling over you. I tore your shirt open and lunged at your extravagant neck, ready to maul it with my teeth.

But I had to stop.

(Because...)

I knew I couldn't leave a mark that Ali might see. You were mine that night, but you were not mine. Frustrated, I traced the tip of my tongue over a jugular vein, which trembled as you moaned my name. My hands unfastened your belt and tore your pants open as though they were a letter of apology sent from a cruel lover. 'What could you possibly have to say for yourself?' my fingers asked, and they found you ready. They stroked you just enough to make you glaringly aware of this fact, and they posed a follow-up question: 'Are you always this hard for her?'

You spoke.

('She was touching you...')

'How does it feel, Bono?'

('Infuriating.')

'...And I wasn't even in love with her.'

You flinched. I wasn't exactly sure about what I wanted to do with you. Why was I wasting time in the car looking for your colors when I could have been devising an actual line of attack? Denying you pleasure was a compelling notion. 'After all, you're getting laid tomorrow night; I'm not,' I silently reasoned. On the other hand, damn it, I wanted to prove that I was as good as Ali. I wanted you to prove your love for me. You shifted beneath me and arranged your hands on the floor beside your head. In a voice that was paradoxically contrite and wanton, you said...

('Let it go, Edge. Take it out on me. Please.')

I clutched your wrists, kissed your mouth possessively, and we thrashed about on the carpet, confiscating and discarding clothing. I stripped you, a lion ravaging a gazelle. You struggled and ultimately succumbed, whimpering expectantly. Your skin was stained with moonlight, and I was hopelessly in love with you. I touched your pale blue cheek. Do you remember what I said?

('You're so beautiful when I can't have you.')

And then what did I say?

('Get on the bed.')

We rose and made our way to the bedroom. You paused several times to turn and face me, bumping into things all the while, but I kept you moving. That night you weren't a boy, or a woman, or any combination of sexual guises...on that bed you and I were men, pleasure-seeking opportunists governed by lust, animalistic conquerors made of muscle, bone, skin, and blood. Your mouth was depraved and blissful around me, and I had all but forgotten the reporter and everything else until you came up for air and asked me...

('You wanted to fuck her, didn't you?')

'Not as much as I want to fuck you.'

('Fuck me now, come on, please...')

'Not until you do something for me first...'

('Gladly.')

'And no, that's not what I'm talking about.'

('I'll do anything you say. What can I do for you, Edge?')

'You know what it is. You should do it tomorrow...when you see her. Stay like that.' You were on your hands and knees. I sat beside you, admiring the undulating landscape of your back. My lips against your right ear, I told you to rest your face on a pillow, and as you obeyed I kissed the newly inclined length of your spine. 'Hold still, baby, and think about it for a while,' I said, moving off the bed. I left you there and stood alongside a window, but instead of watching the always-surprising volume of late night traffic, I studied your dusky reflection in the glass as a minute passed. Then I returned to your side and kissed your brooding lips. 'Where are they, love?'

('Over there...second drawer, I think.' Oh Edge, those delicious sounds I heard as you rummaged through my dresser, looking for my toys...)

I found the one I wanted, the one I had not yet used. I presented it to your lips; you kissed it languorously. 'Open up, baby...' Your eyes met mine as you sucked your plaything. I withdrew it and you sighed...

('Bigger than before.')

'It is. You will undoubtedly feel its resonations tomorrow, and they will remind you that soon this will be mine,' I said, fondling and appraising your backside. I penetrated you with a compassionate indolence as I brought you to the threshold with my left hand. As usual I wished I had the presence of mind to bring a tape recorder...the sounds you were making were captivating, innovative, and impossible to remember.

I calmed you down long enough to tell you this: 'You need to remember, my love, that I am not a toy. When I fuck you...you'll feel my hips, you'll feel my chest and arms draped over your back, and yes, you'll feel my weight...or maybe I'll want to watch your reactions. Turn over darling.'

'I love you,' you gasped, your eyes glistening. 'I'm sorry, Edge.' I could tell that my pain was hurting you, my motherless adolescent, and for the first time you really understood all of it and knew what you had to do.

(We kissed. I wept. And that was all.)

It was strange...we had started out so ferociously, but a deeper, almost mournful bond had been created; all I wanted to do was lie perfectly still and watch you drift off to sleep. I stroked your hair as we held each other in silence; each of us thinking, each of us exhausted. When I awakened several hours later, the room was still dark. Your motionless form was blocking my view of the clock, but I didn't have the motivation to lift my head from the pillow. My left arm had fallen asleep and was tingling, trapped beneath your neck and shoulder. I dislodged it, trying not to wake you. You readjusted your sleeping position, your body utterly relaxed and limp.

(Ninety percent of it, let's say. Right Edge?)

Affirmative. You started to murmur while you slept...

('Please, Edge. I love you.' Are you sure I was still asleep?)

No doubt in my mind.

(Alright. Continue. 'Please, Edge. I love you.')

Your lips formed the words slowly, as if they were sculpting syllables with sound, and the resulting masterpieces dropped heavily onto the mattress.

(You really had no other choice.)

And what man doesn't wish for...

(...a misty, erotic dream that would become more and more realistic with every passing second, so convincing that he would open his eyes and find that it was actually happening? There you were, going down on me as I slept. I felt like Sleeping Beauty.)

Excuse me?

(Isn't it obvious? Those children's fairy tales are really thinly veiled pornography. Little Red Riding Hood? Come on. And Sleeping Beauty is all about a sexual awakening. Prince Charming was kissing more than her mouth, I promise you.)

You are truly unbalanced.

(Someday my prince will come...deep inside me, sir.)

Christ. Suppose this actually happens tonight.

(Oh, it will. Do I hear ninety-three?)

Do you ever wonder what will become of you?

(Me?)

Yes. You've been inside my head for months, trying to make this come to pass. Aren't you worried that if you accomplish your mission you will--I don't know--disappear?

(...)

(Oh my God.)

Yeah.

(That simply can't happen. I love living inside your mind. It's so organized up here! I've done a little redecorating, sure, but no. I'm staying. Besides, where the hell would I go? Larry? He'd just tell me to fuck off. And what would I talk about with Adam--supermodels? Tall girls make me nervous. I'm staying and that's all there is to it, am I making myself perfectly clear? Plus, you'd miss me.)

...

(Reg!)

Yes, I'd miss you.

(OK then. End of discussion. Now, weren't you in the middle of sucking me off in my sleep or something?)

Well, yes, you poet. And your reaction couldn't have been sexier. Your body was entirely lethargic. I watched one hand rise to touch my face, only to be overtaken by gravity several times. Your hips had no idea what was going on; they would follow my lead for a while and then give up. This marginal paralysis made you seem so helpless, and your voice was carnal and lazy, singing that sex song of yours. Your hands eventually reanimated and caressed the back of my head and neck, and out poured an endless stream of...

('I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you')

...and finally...

('Edge. I'll tell her.')

We have another half hour.

(Did I mention I'm loving the watch, Edge?)

There are so many colors in silver, look at this. White, gray, black-and it's like a mirror, reflecting all other nearby colors. Sometimes I'll catch you checking your appearance in the silver blade of a table knife.

(Makes me look tough, doesn't it?)

You're a regular Clint Eastwood.

(Silver suits you. Clear, reflective, cool. But that new ring is gold.)

Uncharacteristically, I overslept that morning. When I opened my eyes you were mysteriously absent.

(I'm an extremely busy man, Edge.)

I wandered into the bathroom to shower. As I removed my watch, I noticed a ring I'd never seen before on my right hand. I took it off. It was a plain gold band, rather broad, and on the inside was...an engraving of a sun. Gold. If I am silver, you are gold.

(Why?)

While objects can be reflected in gold, they are obligated to take on its warm yellow tone. Gold corrupts the reflected image. I can see myself in this ring, but I'm bathed in your color. You're all over me.

(Then I should be wearing gold, not silver.)

Something to think about.

(Speaking of sun, Reg, it is not going to kill you. Let's stretch out on the grass, love.)

All right.

(That's nice. So warm.)

Whenever I lie on the ground like this, I think about how I'm actually clinging to the surface of a planet.

(Hmm.)

This grass is so soft, soft like your hair, only shorter...

(Love you.)

Ahh...can you hear that? Children's voices. When you're away from them for so long you kind of forget how melodious they are.

(You miss your daughters.)

Three aches in my heart. Sweet voices. Your voice. You know I love your voice.

(You have my voice--last night's phone message.)

I do, don't I?

(You recorded it.)

How could I not?

(Play it, Reg.)

You just like to hear the sound of your own voice.

(Reg? Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Bono. I am the singer for a little rock and roll outfit called U2, perhaps you've heard of us? We've made several records and performed here and there. Oh, and yes, I do like to hear the sound of my own voice. I fucking love it.)

........................................................

'Edge? It's me. Ehm...I'm not sure what time it is. The sun is rising...thick golden light with red and purple clouds--royal colors. I'm down by the water. If you're there, pick up...

I did it--I'll talk to you about it when I see you...I guess it will be this afternoon, your time. I'll probably call you again too.

Edge, I miss you. I know you've had to be strong and put up with a lot of my bullshit... I'm holding a shell that's the precise color of your eyes. Do you want it? It's so fragile. Did I ever tell you that your eyes remind me of spinning globes? I'm sorry; that's neither here nor there.

You're right, I mean, you have been a rock about this. It can't be easy for you. I feel guilt; you feel jealousy. I can't decide which is worse. I read Green on the flight over...we'll talk, OK? I don't want to get into it now. My head is spinning. But this call is about you. This is for you.

And...

I know you're there.

Turn off the lights and lie on the bed. Please? It's dark but I can see you. Would you like me to undress you, Edge? Just relax and let me do all the work. Did you have a hard day, love? Poor darling. You know what never gets old? The thrill I get when I see your chest every night for the first time...the way your hair feels against my lips. God, I could spend hours on your chest. And all the way down.

You belong in my mouth, every last inch of you, and I know you adore it. You don't have to say a word, and for once I can't say a word. But do you ever wonder what I'm thinking then? It's this... Just fuck my mouth, hold me in place, I don't care, I'm not important. I want your dark male scent on my neck and face. Thinking about sucking you is making me hard now, Edge. It doesn't take much.

Tonight, please let it be tonight, Edge, I want you on top, with me on my back. I want to see your face when you come inside me. Let me hear you lose yourself.

My love, I know what you're doing now, and that's my hand. I know how you like it, efficient and adept, a gradual acceleration...let me do it. Please, I love the way you feel, so warm and silky, and I'll kiss you all the while, and I'll say all those dirty little things you want to hear, and I'll rub up against you because I can't help myself, because I'm greedy and bad.

You were angry with me. Ahh Edge, you only uttered a handful of sentences, but it was the way you said them that literally brought me to my knees. I nearly fainted there in the bathroom of that bar, and I needed you to be rough, to teach me a lesson. I want you to know that you can do anything you want to me, absolutely anything. Would you like to bend me over your knees? Would you like to tie a blindfold over my eyes? Because I'd like that...very much...'

'Bono.'

'I love you.'

'I'm almost there...baby...'

'Oh love, I meant what I said. Anything. What are you doing?'

'I'm fucking you...'

'Hard?'

'Yes.'

'Tied up?'

'Yes.'

'Blindfolded?'

'Yes.'

'At your mercy?'

'Dear God, yes...'

'Screaming your name?'

'Baby...'

'Edge, Edge, come inside me, Edge, I need it so badly, you know I do, Edge.'

'Oh baby...'

'I can taste you...warm and sharp and sparkling...I love you. I love you.'

'More than I can say.'

'What we have is real, Edge.'

'It is.'

'I'll see you tomorrow love. I'm sending you this sunrise. Pleasant dreams.'

..........................................................

(Oh, I'm good.)

You could say that.

(Are you all right?)

I'm going to look at the sky for a while.

(Can you find my eyes up there?)

Nothing in this sky comes close to matching your eyes.

(There's always the sun. Warming you, melting you...what do you call it when people worship the sun?)

The technical term? Heliolatry, I believe.

(If you stay out here long enough your skin will turn golden.)

Ehm...the color you're thinking of is pink. Need I remind you of my nationality?

(I'm trying to be romantic. With the gold and the sun.)

I know. But be careful. Do you know why pirates and sailors often wore eye patches?

(Well, this ought to be sexy.)

They used the sun to navigate, and it destroyed their vision. The sun is gives us warmth and light and life itself, but at the same time it can be dangerous.

(Nobody said this was going to be easy. But I'm following the sun and it's leading me to you.)

An airplane, look.

(Where?)

The angle of the contrail...it's going to go right in front of the sun.

(An eclipse.)

I always feel like one of the chosen few when I'm in the shadow of an airplane.

(Here it comes.)


	3. Yes/Green/Greener

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've never particularly enjoyed writing angst, but this is my favorite part of Closest.
> 
> Thanks as always to anyone who has had kind words for me about this story. I've even received a drawing, how about that? <3
> 
> PS the "last paragraph" will happen in the next installment.

Chapter 7: Yes.

That's just great. So now I'm psychotic.

(Everybody can have a bad night, I suppose.)

I see they couldn't be bothered to round up a current photo of me, if that is in fact me trapped inside that tiny compartment. I've blown yet another chance at becoming America's sweetheart, it seems. Meanwhile you, my venerated martinet, are the toast of New York.

(I don't know--maybe you could work the psychotic angle to your advantage. It imparts a certain edginess to your new persona.)

I do not need any more edges in my life. God, I can't wait to see you.

(Love...)

Yes?

(Do try to get some sleep after we take off, Bono. You look...)

I know. I am a collection of fried ganglia, wearing my usual bruise palette of black, blue, and, what do you call this, eggplant? I'll do my best to appear fresh as goddamned daisy upon disembarkation.

(Poor baby.)

And do you know what really needles me? That photo is backwards.

(Let it go, B. How are you feeling otherwise?)

Exponentially better. Ahh. Smell that.

(I can't smell, Bono. You'll have to describe it.)

New book smell! Art books have a slightly different scent than regular literature, you see. This one is about Picasso. The paper is slicker and the color reproductions probably play a part in formulating this sweet, papery scent, with just a pinch of photo developer and a hint of brand new box of crayons. Delicious.

(You bought the book for the smell alone, didn't you?)

Well, yes. But look at this; here's a good quote: 'If the things I really love--water, the sun, love--could be bought, I'd have been ruined long ago.' Amen to that. There, my purchase is now justified.

(Have you given any thought as to what you're going to say to me once you arrive in New York?)

As a matter of fact I have. I am going to sort out my thoughts and write them down while I'm on the plane now. And you are going to help me, aren't you?

(Anything you say.)

Hey, that's my line. I'm going to need lots of help--I imagine I was asleep for a total of four hours this weekend.

(Thinking you could successfully pull off this side-trip without becoming seriously exhausted was less naïve than insane.)

...............................................

_[Unsolicited narrative detailing the events of the past day and a half, written by B especially for the enigmatic eyes of his beloved E.]_

_Edge, big news. I saw Prince at LaGuardia Friday night! Rumors had circulated that he was at our concert for a while, but no one could confirm or deny his presence._

_My sighting proves it, I think. There he was, wearing a shirt resembling a Denver omelet and surrounded by an entourage the size of a small Caribbean nation. We greeted each other with the curt nods of old and mutually respected foes. He was much shorter than me as always. His new song is good, though. It ought to put Prince back on top of whatever it was he was on top of...anyway, I'm absolutely certain he was spying on our show. He did not appear to be in high spirits..._

...........................................................

"Hello, little girl."

"You have a big nose."

"My name is Cyrano. Are you Roxane?"

"My name is Elizabeth."

"Don't you wish you had a big nose like mine, Elizabeth?"

"No."

............................................................

 _Edge, I miss our plane and its absence of flinty-eyed children, staring at me Kilroy-ishly over the back of their seats, accompanied by their flamboyantly unattractive, sinisterly tan mothers. The rest of the aircraft is heaving with normal, hardworking, quietly desperate passengers. The décor is white to a degree that seems somehow aggressive, although even within this upper echelon_  
_the plane's interior seems ad hoc and a bit shabby upon further examination. A veneer of tan grime fills the fingerprint-like grooves in the plastic surrounding my window. Earlier I witnessed a particularly juicy, Keystone-quality collision of two men wielding orange cones outside. The sky is the color of old ten pence coins, and with that I think today's word picture has been adequately painted for you, Edge. Excuse me, we're taking off and I want to enjoy the one part of the flight that brings me actual happiness._

............................................................

That's you pushing me back into my chair, Edge.

(You'll need to part your legs a little wider, please.)

I'm being mounted by your G-forces, or something.

(Actually...well, no, skip it.)

Mmm, so good.

............................................................

_Following the satisfying run-in with Prince, my hubris converted back to skittishness as I faced the task at hand, flying home to reunite with Ali and have The Discussion. I steeled myself to go. As Morrissey once said, I can smile about it now but at the time it was terrible. The flight exhibited every indication of a real arrhythmia-producer: turbulence at irregular intervals, sadistically cold air conditioning, nightmarish cabin pressure, and no Edge to comfort me. Thank you very much for giving me something to read. I felt like you were right beside me as I turned the pages. For the remainder of that sleepless flight, I wrapped my jacket tightly around my shivering form, worrying the hem of its sleeves as I contemplated exactly which subphylum of jerk I belonged to..._

............................................................

(And which subphylum is that?)

Two-timing adoration whore.

(You forgot to add 'psychotic.')

Yes. Psychotic, two-timing adoration whore; c'est moi.

.............................................................

_...As protracted as that flight was, it ended all too soon..._

.............................................................

"Here you are, sir."

"Oh. Thank you."

(That looks terrific.)

Brussels sprouts? Those little balls of hell! Edge...

(What is it, B?)

I don't want to eat this...this sandwich. Deeply dissatisfying, and look, they've placed a pickle right next to the bread and now it's all soggy. Let us draw a curtain of charity over the rest.

(You've got to eat something, love.)

Such as?

(I don't know. I am merely repeating what I always say to you in this situation. You've got a big night ahead of you.)

I do, don't I?

(I'll need you to be a big strong boy.)

Oh Edge.

(Okay?)

Yeah. I'll eat something for you.

(Yes, you will.)

............................................................

_...It was raining, and Ali was uncharacteristically late in meeting me. I blew a very legitimate shot at being the most troubled soul in the airport when I noticed a small boy wandering aimlessly through_ _the main concourse, lost and sobbing, looking for Mum. I guided him to an information desk where a middle-aged woman assured me she would find his mother. I sat in a waiting area paneled with mirrors and was forced into displays of public self-scrutiny that were as excruciating as they were irresistible. Every few minutes a pleasant voice announced that a little boy was lost. His name was Jonathan._

_Eventually I saw my bel esprit approaching, searching for me. Her eyes and body darted about the open space with a birdlike economy of movement. My face, jet-lagged and frazzled, stopped her in her tracks. Ali ran over to embrace me, and I felt a strong compunction as she cooed, 'You look terrible, poor darling.'_

_And there she was, apologizing--she was apologizing to me--for being late, describing the Old Testament nature of the storm that seemingly came from out of nowhere, how she couldn't see the road for a while, how her little car needs new wiper blades. I kissed her..._

...................................................

Should I write that I kissed her?

(I think I'll be able to handle it.)

Should I describe it any more than that? The way she smelled like bluebells and night air and...home...and how soft and fragile she felt in my arms? Her neck like a swan's...no.

(No.)

...................................................

_...and she drove me home. Our initial greeting gradually shifted into lists and small talk, then comfortable silence as she concentrated on a few congested intersections and I watched umbrellas blossoming like toadstools on the sidewalk. This calm developed into an unfamiliar, deeply tense absence of comment. I watched her eyes blink rapidly as she clutched the steering wheel and jerkily shifted gears, her diamond ring sparkling coolly. To break the silence I made a few stilted observations about nothing in particular before returning to my narcotized and disassociated state. And then we were home._

_It was mid-afternoon, but in my mind it seemed like...who could possibly say? Early morning? The girls were with their grandparents; apparently Ali had engineered things so we could have some time alone in a female house filled with angels. We closed the door, kissed again, and I asked her if she was alright. She told me she loved me._

_I mentioned a shower might bring me back to life, and she agreed with an immediacy that suggested I did not necessarily smell like bluebells and night air and home. After spending weeks in hotels whose bathrooms are scoured and polished within a centimeter of their lives, it was rather pleasant to see a sink littered with cosmetics, toothpaste, combs, and dolls. The mirror revealed a face that looked the way a bad dream feels, the face of a man who could very much benefit from some professionally dispensed medication. I smelled a reek of fresh plastic; Ali must have replaced the shower curtain. I let the water have its way with me as I considered the two people who have shaped the way I see and organize the world._

......................................................

'...and how much I love them both.' I don't know if I should add that.

(I don't see why not. I know you love her.)

It's just...you reading it...I don't want to seem insensitive.

(Baby. You don't need to soft-pedal that part.)

OK, Reg. I'm keeping the bluebells in there, by the way.

(You've got to do what you feel is right.)

.....................................................

_...and how much I love them both. I decided that when the time came, I would tell the truth without being palliative. She needed to know. You needed me to tell her._

_I found her seated on the long couch eating orange slices. She patted her lap and didn't seem to mind my wet head resting on her thighs. She fed me a few segments and we studied each other quietly for a long time, two people in a waiting room listening for the approaching footfalls of the doctor, and we had each prepared ourselves in case he might have bad news._

_'I missed you so much,' she said._

_'I came back as soon as I could.'_

_'I could not stop crying the other night...I wasn't sure why I felt so lonely. At first I thought it was baby stress, but they always make me feel better. I can look at them and see you in their eyes, their little mouths.' Her voice cracked on the last word. She touched my lips and exhaled, her breath heavy with suspended tears. I closed my eyes. Ali was quiet for a while and then she continued. 'Thank god you have him as a friend,' she said, not even needing to say your name, 'I wish I had someone similar.'_

_My heart broke for her when she said it, and my shoulders and head curled into my chest as if to cover and protect it. I heard a little gasp as her body tensed beneath me; she stopped breathing for a few moments. We both did. Her hands trembled inside mine as she bent and kissed my eyelids. Her voice was small but brave, so much more courageous than anything that ever emerged from my celebrated mouth._

_'I have noticed a change in Edge...it's been there since June. Sellafield. A sadness, a kind of deference to me I've never perceived before,' she whispered._

_'Ali, I have something to say.' I paused._

_'I think I know what it is. He loves you.'_

_'Yes.'_

_'You love him.'_

_'Yes.'_

_'You love me.'_

_'Yes.'_

_'You are in love with me.'_

_'Yes.'_

_'He is in love with you.'_

_'Yes.'_

_'And you are in love with him.'_

_'...Yes. Ali...'_

_'I know.'_

_'How...?'_

_'A wife simply knows...'_

............................................................

Edge, I don't want to cry on this plane.

(Put on your sunglasses. Nobody cares; it's alright. The man next to you is asleep, and the lights are dimming--looks like they're ready to show a movie.)

I've been rather lighthearted about this today, but now that I'm actually writing it all down, it's absolutely grueling.

(She was so strong.)

Her pain...her grace...

(I know why you love her. Go ahead, Bono. It's okay. I'm here.)

You're not but you are.

(I love you.)

Yes.

.........................................................

_'...I don't deserve you, Ali.'_

_'You need both of us,' she said with a weary candor. I looked at her dear face, lined with three wet streams like pathways in the snow, leading to her bottomless eyes. She tried to smile but could_ _only manage a tremulous frown._

_Need. Needy. That's what I am, and it causes her pain. I'm not as resilient as she is, and she knows it._

_'He is a beautiful human being,' she continued._

_'As are you, love,' I whispered pathetically, barely comprehending what she was saying to me._

_'It's always been much harder for you to be alone than it has been for me. I worry about you. The thought of you feeling isolated and despondent seems somehow worse to me than the alternative...I'd rather you were with someone who loves you, and if that person is Edge...'_

_'I love you.'_

_'It's hard for me to feel...so bad about it. I've spent the better part of a month turning this idea over and over in my mind. And now that I know...there's a sense of...peace.'_

_'I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.'_

_'I want you to be happy.'_

_'What about you?'_

_'It won't be easy for me, but I love you that much. I love you both...'_

.......................................................

Goddess...

(You made love to her.)

You were there. You were quiet, but you were there.

(Yes.)

I wasn't sure if you would go away this time.

(I will always be with you.)

That's good. But what should I write? You know what happened. It was truly exquisite. I mean, I don't know how to begin to describe it, or how much I should even try to say.

(Write something general, just to give an idea of what took place. You don't need to go into detail, but you should tell the truth.)

The truth. You deserve the truth.

......................................................

_...We soothed and held each other for a long time, both of us feeling fragile and dazed. Eventually our mouths connected and wouldn't let go. The memory of your mouth made it feel like I was kissing her with a burnt tongue as I rediscovered her luminous body. I had foolishly wondered--after being with you and after telling her about it--if I would approach sex with Ali differently. Would I become lifeless and ineffectual? Would I make love to her with the mindless constancy of a machine? But nothing had changed. If anything, I had gained a new appreciation of all the things that make her special. The feeling of once again being the dominant partner was truly fascinating to me, especially now that you've given me a new understanding of what it means to submit._

_I'm not sure how much of this you want to know, Edge. I hope I'm not going too far. Ali and I still have a long way to go with the implications of this...I hate to call it an arrangement. But we have weathered the worst of the storm, I think. I hope. You and I can talk about this later, and I'll tell you anything else you want to know about what happened this weekend._

.............................................................

(That's good, I think.)

I love you. I'm going to write about something lighter now. This was so hard.

(I'm used to your mood swings. Write about whatever you like.)

.............................................................

_...What do you think of this pad of paper? Hello Kitty has never been my first choice in stationery, but I was indeed desperate. A student who is sitting in coach somewhere, incidentally, asked me for a photo and an autograph. 'What will you give me in return?' I asked shrewdly. She opened her red leather purse and told me I could take whatever I wanted. I confiscated this notebook, although I could have also used her lipstick, don't you think? Because we're running out...in any case, she wanted me to sign her purse with a permanent marker. 'Contradiction is balance. Bono.' I wrote. I posed for a photo, and come to think of it, I may have been holding a can of Diet Coke at the time. I'm sure there will be no repercussions, but if Coca-Cola wants to use that image of me, they'd better be prepared to pay a truly astronomical permission fee._

_Sorry about the tangent. Ali and I ate dinner, talked about the girls, and shared some silent moments that were filled with a poignancy and tenderness that made me realize how much our love can truly withstand._

_I realize I'm skipping ahead here, but I called you the next morning at sunrise, and I am completely convinced you heard the entire message and have played it back at least once today. It's no secret that you are bewitched by my voice. What did you say about it a couple of months ago? 'Your voice could make German sound lush and post-coital.' We should put some German on our next album just to mess with people's minds, what do you say?_

........................................................

(Let's try to finish this thing sometime today.)

Sorry. You must want some rest, too.

(You wear me out, B.)

........................................................

_...Where was I? Back to that night. Ali and I slept for a few hours, our bodies intertwined as the rain finally dissipated. My eyes opened at around one o'clock and refused to close again. I watched her sleep for a while; the two of you have much in common. You're both so motionless and peaceful that on any number of occasions I've checked to see if your hearts were still beating. I said a prayer, thanking god for Ali and you. I stared at the ceiling, thinking about...everything. I wandered downstairs and watched that wee-hour infomercial I'm kind of a fan of, followed by a documentary about various 'risky' sexual activities, described in just enough detail to engage the grimmer parts of the imagination. I returned to Ali, kissed her, and told her I was going for a walk._

_I thought about you as I walked, Edge. I thought about your body, how it has always reminded me of familiar roads leading away from the city, the old Military Road, for example. But now I'm seeing new things about you, love, including your really pointy elbows. Yeah, don't think I haven't noticed. And spotting these new details makes me feel like I'm not driving anymore; I am a passenger, free to gaze at the scenery as much as I please now that I don't have to concentrate on the road. I like this. I am drunk on you, Edge, and I have handed you the keys. I love you. B._

 

8: Green.

That flight attendant is officially on my short list.

(What’s he doing now?)

Just look at him. He seems to be constantly posing for a photograph no one is taking.

(andyoudon’t?)

What did you say?

(Not important.)

When he’s not posing, he is nosing around in that food preparation area that is surrounded by an almost Masonic air of secrecy. Here he comes. Watch this.

“Excuse me?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Could you tell me how many more hours until we land?”

“Ooh, somebody’s in a hurry to get to New York!”

“…”

“Hot date all lined up?”

“…”

“It’ll be about four more hours, sir.”

“Thank you.”

“Y’absolutely!”

‘Y’absolutely?’ That’s not even a word. Short list. And now to endure four more hours of suspended animation…

(Why don’t you try to watch the second movie?)

I’m too restless.

(Maybe that’s why you should do it. Part of the magic of watching a movie is surrendering to it and letting it dominate you.)

Say that again, Edge.

(Part of the magic of watching a movie is surrendering to it and letting it dominate you.)

One more time…slower…the good part.

(Surrendering to it, letting it dominate you.)

You should be a movie star. No, I’ve seen this one three times already, and anyway we both know I’m saving myself for you tonight. I’m going to read Green again. Green is such a gorgeous color, Reg. It has an incredible range, from acid to olive to emerald to jade…so versatile…and it’s the complement to red. Robert Rauschenberg once said that red was the most difficult color to work with.

(Did he, now?)

I love how you set up your little spiral notebook just like mine, with the erased title on the cover and the blurbs on the back. But you went one step further and illustrated certain passages. It makes me weak in the knees.

(Why?)

Just imagining you drawing pictures for me. I think it’s very romantic. Your drawings are better than mine. They’re like biological illustrations: detailed, labeled, and carefully planned. They make my drawings look like half-baked John Lennon rip-offs.

(That’s because your drawings are…)

Stop right there before you say something you’ll regret, Edge.

……………………………………………………

_Praise for Green:_

_“Can I spend a day inside your head one time? I think it'd be interesting.”—Paul McGuinness._

_“This was a brilliant work of sensual hedonism.”—Adam Clayton._

_“You made me cry, you fuck.”—Larry Mullen, Jr._

_“I worship the last paragraph.”—Bono._

………………………………………………………

I do, you know.

(I was impressed that you did not immediately skip to the last paragraph the first time you read that.)

It was an act of enormous personal self-discipline.

………………………………………………………

_Green._

_A short story by Edge._

_*_

_Text copyright 1992 by Edge, The._

_Grateful acknowledgement is made to EMI Publications for use of “Bang a Gong” by Marc Bolan, 1969; Screen Gems EMI Music, Inc. for use of “I Know What Boys Like” by The Waitresses, 1982; Warner Bros. for use of “If 6 Was 9” by Jimi Hendrix, 1969._

_Printed (psychotically tiny) in New York City._

_First and only edition._

_*_

_Dedicated to the undisputed majesty that is Bono._

_*_

_Green._

_*_

_Thank you for the sun ring, love. I’m going to miss you tonight. I miss you now. Where are you this afternoon, anyway?_

_What to say…so far I’m enjoying watching this ink as it glistens on the surface of the paper before it dries. Here is my plan: I’ll draw something for you whenever words fail me._

_I am here in my own Plaza suite for a change, where they have redundantly re-made the untouched bed, re-dusted the undusty furniture, and re-cleaned the unused bathroom. It must be SOP for this hotel._

……………………………………………..

(Standard Operating Procedure.)

Of course.

…………………………………………….

_I fear I may become asphyxiated by the disinfectant they’ve used in the bathroom. I am sitting at a desk two rooms away and I can still smell it: an approximation of the organochemical scent of a lemon, created by somebody who has never encountered a lemon but has read about them in the past._

_The Weather Channel is on television. Over the past few days. I’m afraid I have started to develop an erotic attachment to this meteorologist. Nothing to be upset about, Bono, but his delivery is so knowledgeable and self-assured. I’m actually learning things from him._

_The staff at this hotel are so fresh and alert they look slapped. Just a few minutes ago a guy who wouldn’t dream of hitting me up for a gratuity came in with this…this tray. It’s loaded with fruit, nuts, and candy. A tiny card reads, “You are the sun.” Here is a drawing of it._

……………………………………………….

Oh Reg, what a charming still life. You must have come back to this later; next to each piece of fruit is a rating from one to ten and occasional remarks: ‘too many seeds’; ‘do whatever it takes to get me more of these’; ‘I pretended this was you.’

……………………………………………….

_Last night was exhausting. No wonder I slept most of the morning. I felt the entire spectrum of emotions, from anger to forgiveness, from sorrow to gratification, all fueled by my love for you. I don’t want to recount every day of the last two months—it would be foolish to try—but I would like to describe Sellafield, my birthday, and that afternoon in the rain._

_Sellafield._

_Appropriately, our first day apart was the longest day of the year. We weren’t technically ‘apart.’ Rather, I didn’t have you all to myself anymore. Ali returned._

_She joined us after our Stop Sellafield concert in Manchester: bubbly, thrilled to see you, and even more beautiful than I had allowed myself to remember. You dropped something and rushed to her side. Ali has never been particularly demonstrative with you in public, but that night she lifted your sunglasses, studied your face carefully for a few seconds, squealed, and kissed your laughing mouth. You whispered something to her, eliciting another shriek and some excited, almost convulsive movements that reminded me of…you, actually. When you sing the chorus of Pride, for example, when you not only have to locate the outer limits of your vocal range but also belt them out, your body winds itself tightly around those marvelous sounds in order to catapult them into the stratosphere. As they are released, you appear to be in ecstasy and physical torment. It can be difficult to watch—I feel the kind of sympathetic pain I experience when I see somebody with an eye injury—but as always with you, it’s too irresistible to look away._

_You were kissing her and I couldn’t look away. I forced myself to pick up your notebook. It was mostly empty, a few scraps of lyrics scattered here and there. We boarded the bus after midnight and were on the road until dawn._

……………………………………………………………..

You’ve drawn a seating chart, with you, Bill, and Larry at the back of the bus. You took your customary spot by the window. Ali and I were one row ahead of you on the other side of the bus, and you’ve indicated that I attempted to lie down in the aisle with one of my arms draped over her lap.

……………………………………………………………...

_I drifted in and out of consciousness at least twenty times on that bus ride; I don’t think any of us really slept. I could hear you telling Bill a few lurid if dubious stories as Ali chuckled. Adam uncorked a bottle of champagne. Most of the time I looked out the window, watching amorphous dark shapes roll by like the leftover film at the end of a movie reel. What do you call that? I should ask Willie._

_About an hour before sunrise, the bus was as quiet as it was going to get. I felt your hand touching my ankle, deliberately exploring and caressing it as you pulled down my sock. I bent down and placed my hand over yours, cool on warm. You wrapped your fingers around mine and stroked them for a couple of seconds. On some level you may have known what I was feeling and you were trying to console me, but we couldn’t stay in that position for long and I withdrew._

_On the longest day of the year the sun rises at 4:30, and I was there to watch it happen. I was there before that to watch the world change from black and white to color. I was there before that to watch you crawl up to Ali, in an alluring state of moonlit dishabille, and bury your face in her breasts as she quietly told you to stop, darling, people will see._

_I don’t want to replay everything that happened that day—the three hours aboard the Greenpeace ship, the inflatable ride to the beach near Sellafield 2, the barrels of contaminated Irish mud we left as a ‘return to sender’ gesture, or the long ride back—you remember all of it as well as I do. But I think I will mention a few things neither one of us has fully acknowledged or discussed since then._ _You and Ali disappeared as soon as we boarded the ship, and from what I hear, you didn’t have any more privacy in one of the empty cabins than you had on the bus—some woman tried to join you on a cot? As if you needed another participant in your sexual life. The other sixty or so protesters gathered in various pockets and discussed the business of the day. I went over to a cluster of them, rattling off details about Sellafield every once in a while. Three people got into a heated debate concerning the filming of our protest; it went on for an absurd amount of time with me just standing there._

_I spent the majority of the journey on deck in the imported beer-colored light, looking out at the Irish Sea, feeling like an unasked question. You know, one thing my parents neglected to tell me when I was growing up was this: ‘David, never get romantically involved with a married man.’_

_An insouciantly pretty young woman joined me at the railing, mentioning that ‘something’s up atmospherically.’ We proceeded to engage in the most intelligent discussion of fog I’ve ever enjoyed. She admitted that while she recognized us, she was not a big fan our music; she was in fact a cellist. ‘You’re good-looking in a kind of unhappy way,’ she said bluntly, and I had to laugh at that._

_‘Edge!’ you shouted, bounding over to me, followed by Ali and Paul._

_‘Hey, B,’ I said as you pinched the area on my face where a cheek would be if I had them, in the first clownishly affectionate gesture you would bestow upon me that day. The cellist drifted away as you launched into your seventy-fifth rant detailing your immense disappointment that there would be no concert today. Paul steered you out of it, mentioning he had some kind of idea involving flags. In your typical, childlike desire to run the whole sandbox, you demanded to see the flags immediately. You followed Paul back inside, and I was left alone with Ali by the railing. I had many things to say about fog. Eventually the small talk faded and we were engulfed in a silence similar to the odd stillness that tends to precede Midwestern storms._

…………………………………………………………..

Here is an illustration of different kinds of clouds, in order of preference: cumulonimbus, cirrus, stratus, cumulus, cirrostratus, nimbostratus, stratocumulus…you are such an adorable weather geek.

(I know what boys like.)

We’re going to have to do a cover of that song, you and me, for our own personal amusement, you realize.

…………………………………………………………..

_I couldn’t believe your nerve on the ship after we had donned those ludicrous radiation suits. We studied each other for a few seconds, both of us on the verge of laughter, costars in our own private burrito advertisement. You kissed your shoulder and stroked your chin—you—and moaned my name before taking me in your arms. You made sure we held that pose for several moments longer than the circumstances could have possibly warranted. It was all I could do to maintain my composure as you murmured, ‘I dare you to strip me and fuck me right here, Edge.’ Every word out of your mouth after that sentence was a jewel-like soundbite: ‘Talk about safe sex!’ you shouted to the Greenpeace crowd. ‘You can’t get much safer than this!’_

_The rest of the morning was kind of a blur: Paul’s silly flag exercise, the trip ashore, fumbling around with those barrels on crude little trolleys…I almost cut my thumb, no thanks to you, love. You were_ _more than happy to field reporters’ questions and pose heroically as the rest of us bumbled around on the beach. I suppose we made some kind of point. Before I knew it we were back on the bus._ _I stared out the window some more; my alternative was to witness the bonding of husband and wife. You couldn’t keep your hands off her. A little voice told me you were clearly overcompensating for something. I don’t know. You looked so happy. We stopped by a restaurant in the middle of nowhere for the kind of bacon-y food that caused me to question my own salvation. You cluelessly invited me to join you and Ali outside for a picnic. I rolled my eyes and said, ‘I’ve seen enough of it for one day.’ Bill overheard this and I hope he took that to mean The Great Outdoors, not My Lover and His Stunning Wife._

_Eventually we headed for home and a month-long break. I felt like a schoolboy at the top of his academic game, facing a long holiday and secretly wishing he could keep going to class. I did not want to confront that empty house. I did not want to think about you and Ali. I did not want to watch the fingers of your right hand claiming her shoulder while you winked at me clandestinely. Instead I focused on three nearby flies trying to sort out their own complicated relationships, each searching for a passage to the other side of the glass._

 

9: Greener.

................................................

Edge. I am...

(It's OK. You did what you needed to do for us.)

...so sorry. Really.

(Nobody said it was easy.)

I love you.

.................................................

_A hurricane is developing in the Gulf of Mexico. I know it's wrong, but why does this news please me? When I hear about earthquakes or erupting volcanoes, why is my first response always, 'cool'?_

.................................................

Those things remind you that something bigger than us is at work out there, Edge.

(You're probably right.)

Is that Greenland below us?

(I think so.)

You once spent a half-hour telling me about plate tectonics and the idea of whole continents...moving. It's a mere fraction of an inch every year, but they are moving beneath our feet. Pressure builds as they rub up against each other, and when one plate is forced to slide down beneath another, violent events happen--volcanoes, earthquakes--but at the same time beautiful things are created--islands, mountains.

(You really listened to me.)

You make a point of explaining science in ways I can understand, Edge. And just look at this map of the southern United States. Don't tell me you drew it from memory. There is the hurricane, a big swirling snowflake, with arrows pointing in the direction of Florida. Below that are cartoonish drawings of a traffic light swaying back and forth in the wind and a drenched news correspondent in a hooded raincoat holding a microphone, along with the caption: 'no hurricane coverage is complete without these two images.'

(There ought to be similar reporting when Hurricane Bono makes landfall in New York City this afternoon.)

....................................................

_Bono, this story can't hold a candle to Pink, I'm afraid, and I know the last thing anybody wants to read is a monotonous tale of jealousy and uneasiness. The less said about July the better. Now that I've established this fact, I am going to continue my monotonous tale of jealousy and uneasiness. It will pick up after a bit, I promise. But you already know that._

_As the sun set on the longest day of the year, I unlocked the door to my house with a real metal key, not a piece of plastic. The thick, dormant air inside was startled. I opened some windows and looked around. How many months had passed? I was too tired to care very much. I collapsed on my stale bed and didn't move for hours._

_The phone rang and I knew it was you. No one else calls me at three o'clock in the morning._

_'You didn't say goodbye to me.'_

_'Goodbye, Bono.'_

_'Don't hang up!'_

_You flitted about from topic to topic: did you see us on the news I can't believe how much my daughters have grown my god the air out here is absolutely glorious oh I'm sorry Edge did I wake you one of these days you and I are going to share a bottle of this what is this Chateau Margaux so good I'm literally trembling you seemed angry with me today are you because I'd hate for you to be angry I love you Edge it's just I hadn't seen Ali in months and I still want you to fuck me you name the time and the place and I'll be there except well not this week I wanted to tell you that Ali surprised me tonight she's made plans for ten days in Nice...Edge?_

_'You'll have a wonderful time.'_

_'I love you.'_

_'I'm sure you do.'_

_I turned on the bedside lamp and saw Anton's photographs of you on the floor, stacked up against the wall. I hadn't had time to hang them the last time I was...I guess you could call this home. Diamonds were still cutting into the flesh of your neck._

_'You're angry.'_

_'I don't know what I am.'_

_'Edge, if I could be in your bed right now, the things I'd do to you.'_

_'No, Bono.'_

_'God, I'd suck you all night.'_

_'Baby.'_

_'So sexy when you're hard for me...'_

_'I'm going back to sleep now.'_

_'Do you really think you can?'_

_'Goodbye, Bono.'_

_'Fuck me, Edge.'_

_I placed the diamond photo beneath my bed and I fucked your pretty mouth, your rosy lips, your too-white teeth, and your eloquent tongue. Your silent screams penetrated all the way to the back of my skull._

_Thus began six very long-seeming weeks I will never fully tell you about. Each night I kept a guitar on your side of the bed. The tree of jealousy growing inside me was collecting new rings at a disturbing pace. The next day while driving, I fortuitously found myself following your car and witnessed a snit of royal proportions. Something had upset you deeply; your hands were gesticulating madly while Ali grabbed the wheel. You stopped ranting for a moment--she must have known some magic words--and then you both laughed. I made an unnecessary right turn when I saw her head settle on your shoulder._

_It didn't help that all the songs on the radio last month spoke to our situation or at least mocked it. 'Jealous Guy' by John Lennon, anyone? How about 'Wouldn't It Be Nice' by the Beach Boys? Shopping for groceries seemed more pointless than ever, and there was certainly no escaping the piped-in music they were more than happy to provide. One morning I was putting food in my cart I thought you might like--god knows everything looked the same to me--and I acerbically answered yes to every question in Elvis Presley's 'Are You Lonesome Tonight?'_

_I started to listen to talk radio in the car and revisited my obsession with traffic reports. I don't know why I care; it's not as though I change my normal driving routes for any reason. There are parts of Dublin I haven't seen in years simply because they are not part of my regular circuit. Why can't I bring myself to change that? Why can't I go to a different gas station every now and then, for heaven's sake?_

_I spent more and more time with my daughters. Thank god for my daughters._

.....................................................

You haunted me each night in Nice.

(Please. Not the shadow people again.)

They're real, Reg.

(...)

Don't you roll your eyes at me, mister. They're real! In Nice they usually made themselves known when it was night and I was lying naked in bed, half-asleep and on my stomach. My eyes would fly open and I would think...somebody is watching me. I would whip my head around and, well, nobody would be there, but this is the point: they were there before I tried to catch them. Shadow people were watching me, and one of them was you.

(Let me try to sort this out. Not only do you hear my voice and have imaginary-friend conversations with me in your head, but now you're convinced another version of me is monitoring your naked body as you sleep?)

What can I say? I am in love.

(You'd better be.)

I know. The things I've put you through. It's inexcusable. I will never forget the unreadable expression on your face when I first saw you after I returned from my holiday. You were outside Windmill Lane, leaning against an iron fence so sharp-looking I didn't want to get anywhere near it.

......................................................

_That afternoon in the rain._

_'You're late, my darling,' I snarled at you. We were supposed to meet Willie, who wanted us to see some new video sequences he thought would work well in a stadium environment. You tilted your head down slightly, and then you looked up at me with those eyes--who are you trying to be when you do that, Princess Diana?_

_It was working._

_To further manipulate me, you were wearing red, big surprise, and you were tan...your approximation of tan, anyway, which is the skin equivalent of Neapolitan ice cream. To be more precise, your skin was the color of a carton of Neapolitan ice cream that you had ransacked before handing it over to me: plenty of pink and white with only small fragments of brown._

_'Edge, I told her I wouldn't be home until very late. Let's get this out of the way quickly, all right?'_

_I nodded and followed you into the studio. You slowed down a bit as you mounted the stairs. I was close behind you when you quietly remarked, 'It feels so good to wear leather again. I'm more...aware of myself.' I slid my hand up your thigh. 'Just like that,' you said, looking back at me._

_Willie was eager to show us his new footage. 'You're going to have to imagine everything looking, you know, about four thousand times this size,' he said. We stood behind his chair in the darkened room and watched over his shoulder for about twenty minutes. I touched the small of your back and allowed my hand to drop down. It settled on a back pocket with the sole purpose of making you more...aware of yourself. Aware of me._

_'Perfect. No. Great. No. Yes. Love it. Black and white would be better,' you declared as the choppy images of dancing girls, helicopters, livestock, wigs, Mount Rushmore, lipstick, and ants flew across the screen._

_'You're awfully decisive today,' Willie laughed. 'What do you think, Edge?' he asked as the flags of the world flashed by in rapid succession._

_'I think Japan has the world's best-designed flag.'_

_'Oh no, Edge, how can you turn your back on Ireland like that?'_

_'I've never liked orange and green together. It makes me think of mixed vegetables or something.'_

_'Shocking. What am I going to do with you?' you scolded, leaning into my hand._

_We looked back at the screen and fell silent as we watched a gritty detail of two oil derricks bobbing rhythmically--fellatially--up and down, up and down against a white background. 'I think I like that best of all,' you said. 'Tell me, Willie, is there much more?'_

_'Well, not really. I'll be working on this stuff all week if you've got other things to do.'_

_'Oh, we'll be back. Your work never ceases to inspire us, right, Edge?'_

_'Yeah. Thanks, Willie.'_

_'You've given us a lot to think about.'_

_We exited the studio in a hurry. 'My car,' I said. You were way ahead of me, and you stood by the passenger side, waiting for me to open the door for you. I noticed a small maple leaf clinging to my windshield and briefly considered the Canadian flag--not the greatest flag, but respectable. That leaf must have been from one of my trees. What was keeping it there? I started the car and looked at you in the colorless, overcast light._

_'Your ear is sunburned,' I noted with a certain amount of satisfaction. It served you right, taking off for the south of France while I did stupid things like buying groceries. 'Come here, let me see.'_ _You leaned towards me. I ran my tongue over the pinkest part and blew lightly to cool your poor ear. 'I missed you so much, Edge,' you sighed as I bit your earring and tugged on it gently._ _I pulled out of the lot and began the journey to my house. Your hand surrounded mine on the gearshift. 'Why in the world are we listening to talk radio?' you asked, changing radio stations like a fourteen year-old girl and fine-tuning the air conditioning to meet your exact specifications. 'Ahh, we just missed our old friend Sting,' you noted as the last bars of 'Every Breath You Take' gradually faded. It started to rain, an irregular mist that forced me to adjust the windshield wiper setting again and again._

_An unmistakable chugging rhythm slithered out of the stereo. 'Reg, they're playing our song, love,' you purred, jacking the gearshift while you sang to me, 'Well you're dirty and sweet, clad in black, don't look back, and I love you...' I spotted a minor side road and pulled over. 'Only kissing,' I said, holding your wrists together. We kissed for the first time in twelve days--mad, insatiable kisses that lasted the duration of the song. The rain became a filmy white curtain that encircled the car._

_'Jimi,' you moaned, kissing my fingertips as 'If 6 Was 9' began to play. 'Now if 6 turned out to be 9, I don't mind, I don't mind,' you sang. Then you said with a wicked grin, 'Tell me, Edge, is there some reason why you've never been 6 and I've never been 9?' You sucked my right index finger and I smiled. 'Can that be our first order of business, then?' you continued._

_'Yes,' I managed._

_'I'm gonna wave my freak flag high, love,' you chuckled, pleased with yourself._

_I kissed you roughly, wanting exclusive rights to your dirty mind. 'I should have fucked you when I had the chance,' I told you as I pulled back onto the main road. 'No more games...just you...on your back...and me...I should have fucked you.'_

_'Yes, you should have. You should have fucked me in Stockholm; God knows I was begging for it. And now you can't stand it, can you, Edge? You wake up in the morning hard for me, but there's no way your left hand and some photograph will be anything like an acceptable facsimile of my mouth, of my body...do you want me to keep talking?'_

_'Yes.'_

_You kept talking all the way to my house, and the leaf continued to adhere to the windshield. I peeled it off and put it in my pocket while you paced near my front door, impatient, breathtaking, and wet._

.......................................................

You've glued fragments of that leaf to the bottom of the page, filling in the missing parts with your pen...you've written my name on the leaf with a black permanent marker.

........................................................

_We couldn't get inside my house fast enough. I pulled your shirt open and discovered the diamonds I had given you. Your hands were all over me, trying to remove everything at once as I kissed you...and then the telephone rang._

_'Christ, I hate that sound,' I said._

_'Don't tell me you're going to answer it.'_

_'It might be important.'_

_It wasn't. It was Paul. I can't remember what he had to say. I watched you lock the door and undress beside my kitchen table. You sat down and stared at me as I tried to liberate myself from Paul. By the time I hung up you were dipping your finger into my sugar bowl._

_'You...'_

_'I'm eating sugar because last night we ate Thai food, and I'm afraid I have the breath of the damned.'_

_'Bono, I don't give a fuck.'_

_You grinned. 'See, that's exactly the problem, Edge.'_

_'We're still going to wait.'_

_'Changed your mind, Mr. I Should Have Fucked You When I Had the Chance?'_

_'It can't happen now, not here. It doesn't seem right yet, and you're not ready. Trust me.'_

_'We'll be in New York next month.'_

_'Yes we will.'_

_'All right, I trust you. I suppose I can wait. Have some sugar, Edge.'_

_I sucked your finger and followed you to my bedroom, marveling at how utterly comfortable you are in your own skin. 'Some people have no shame,' I said, trapping you between two bookcases and running my fingers across your chest._

_'Oh Edge, I try to have plenty of shame,' you alleged, 'that way sex will always be dirty.' You removed my belt and put it in my hands, murmuring, 'For later.'_

_I backed you into the bedroom where you took off my clothes. You looked away from me for a moment and were highly pleased to see large photographs of yourself lining the north wall. 'Which one do you look at the most, love?' you asked, standing in front of them, gently tugging on your diamond necklace._

_'Stay there, Bono, don't move,' I said. 'I just want them to be real.'_

_You closed your eyes and that slow smile strolled across your face. I approached you, whispering, 'Perfectly still...' You were my flawless living sculpture, and I was the artist who had designed you, and you were finished at last, and I could run my hands all over my beautiful creation and kiss him and smell him and take him in my mouth._

_Your obedient legs began to tremble after a few minutes of this. I broke your pose and arranged your arms behind your back, binding them together with my belt. You exhaled contentedly. 'On the bed,' I said, helping you lie down. I kissed your stomach. 'Tell me, baby, what do you always say about what we're going to do?'_

_You paused. 'It's one of the most equal sexual positions.'_

_'Don't you think it will become even more so with two men?'_

_'I'm certain of it, although...'_

_'Yes?'_

_'You're in charge, Edge. I'm not. I am here to do what you say.'_

_'That's what I like to hear, love.'_

_I had never experienced anything quite like it and neither had you. With a woman, sixty-nine can be distracting. I am usually so busy trying to please her that I tend to ignore what she is doing to me. But this was different. We didn't even have to think. We simply knew. To give the same sensations we received...it was divine. You stopped sucking me for a moment and I looked up at you; your expression seemed to say, 'Do you believe how good this is?' We smiled and returned to each other. The rest of the world fell away, and soon it was impossible to tell where your pleasure ended and mine began, my tied-up, beautiful boy._


	4. Magdalene/Prelude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "We awoke to the scent of chocolate" is a tribute to my old-school partner in crime, leelah, who began a hot little south-of-France story called Bagna Cauda with "They awoke to the scent of lavender." I miss you and your beautiful words, l.
> 
> The thing with the cinnamon candy works. I keep a little tin of them in my desk in case of lipstick emergencies.
> 
> Anybody want to guess what song that guitar tab is from? ;)

10: Magdalene

..........................................

_We awoke to the scent of chocolate. The Hotel Hershey, a Pennsylvanian fortress/resort crowning some kind of chocolate-themed amusement park, used this as a selling point. After being there for several days, the novelty had worn off, and the only time I noticed the faint but technically still-there scent was the instant my eyes opened._

_'Come with me...and you'll be...in a world of pure imagination,' you sang drowsily to my neck. 'Happy birthday to you.' You extracted yourself from my embrace and squirmed beneath the sheet. Objective: seduction. I glanced at the clock. Not much time._

_'Bono, I love that, but...' I began._

_'You don't have to say it every single day, Edge. I know you love my butt,' you laughed, kissing my stomach._

_'Get up here, please. We have to leave in fifteen minutes.'_

_'What? You can't be serious. It's your birthday. You require servicing.'_

_'Sorry, we can't do this.'_

_'OK, sir, but I know you want it. Badly. It's painfully obvious, wouldn't you say?' Your lips returned to my neck and proclaimed, 'Today I plan to worship you, Edge. Yes. With my body I thee worship. Dance with me, love.' You were hard against my upper thigh, moving rhythmically._

_'Please, B, take it down a notch.'_

_'If you won't fuck me, maybe I should fuck you,' you growled, comically attempting to roll me over. I raised an eyebrow. 'Just kidding. Presents!' you said brightly. 'You are not leaving this bed without opening at least one of them.' It was the calculator watch. 'You have no idea how impossible it was for me to find one of these. It was, in fact, completely impossible. This is the only titanium calculator watch in the known universe--and it was created especially for you, Edge.' You ceremoniously slipped it on my wrist and pushed random buttons._

_'I am touched beyond belief, love.'_

_'I'll touch you beyond belief.'_

_The phone rang. Despite your medley of obscene hand gestures, it continued to ring. You availed yourself of the facilities while moaning jazzy variations on the birthday song. The excellent acoustics of the bathroom created an echo chamber that forced me to place my hand over the receiver so Paul wouldn't get the wrong/right idea. We (I) had by then developed a packing system where any given suitcase contained clothing for both of us. You threw on some black items, raked a hand through your hair, and declared yourself ready to take on the day._

_As I went through my morning routine, you made sure that I was perfectly aware of how much you loved me, how astonishingly capable your hands can be, and how disillusioned you were with the lack of pre-breakfast sex. You also provided timely and thoughtful updates on the state of my erection while I brushed my teeth. The rest of that morning, as we jumped through our respective hoops, my thoughts returned to you time after time, the way a favorite song will continue to cycle in my mind after it has been stopped midstream._

_You and I had an interview with...I can't even remember anymore, and you talked about the unparalleled success of the first Outside Broadcast and the party we had the night before, along with the dizzying variety of things to do in Hershey. I was asked if I had any special birthday rituals, and I mentioned that when I was a child my father used to take me out to the country several hours before sunrise and we would watch the Perseids, an annual meteor shower._

_You caught up with me later that afternoon. I was sitting on our bed practicing, trying to figure out a slowly climbing chord sequence that had the potential to become something interesting. You held up your hands as if to say 'just ignore me, keep playing,' so I continued. You sat on the floor and watched quietly, your chin resting on my knee. Soon I had the distinct impression that my shoes were becoming untied, and that's exactly what you were doing, taking my shoes off for some reason. Then you retrieved something from underneath the bed, whispering, 'Keep going, love.' New boots. You were on your hands and knees lacing them up for me and...kissing them one grommet at a time._

_'I love you, Bono,' I said as you were finishing, which seemed to startle you momentarily. You smiled and moved onto the bed behind me, your lips delivering soft vowels to my ear, the letter O to be precise. Five kisses along my cheekbone, each with its own agenda, and you were out the door._

_E --x-x------2---------x-x------2---------x-x-------2-4----------_  
_B --4-5----5----5------4-5----5----5------4-5-----5--------------_  
_G --4-4--4-------------4-4--4-------------4-4---4----------------_  
_D --2-2----------------2-2----------------2-2--------------------_  
_A ---------------------------------------------------------------_  
_E ----------------------------------------------------------------_

_After I finished practicing that afternoon, I turned around on the bed and noticed a small photo album you had left behind. For me. It was a collection of photographs you had taken of the sun, each labeled according to location and accompanied by a brief description of that evening..._

_'Albany: wan, vulnerable March sun you can look right at...you were my spider for the second night in a row._

_'Los Angeles: darling fat peach floating above the ocean...if Adam heard us he didn't say anything about it the following morning._

_'Paris: I was waiting for you to come back from shopping (??) while watching two doves build a nest outside my window...trademark enigmatic expression on your face when you returned; you kept_ _laughing for no discernible reason._

_'Rotterdam: indescribable scent in the air; I tried to spot the wires suspending this red disk, like your favorite Japanese flag, above the city...I begged you to fuck me.'_

_...and on and on. It was astonishing, Bono. On the last page was a ridiculously formal invitation: 'Mr. The Bono requests the intense pleasure of your company at his magnificently appointed hotel room to celebrate the blessed birth of his longtime companion Mr. The Edge, on August 8, Nineteen-hundred and ninety-two, at eleven o'clock in the evening. Worship service to follow. No need to R.S.V.P., as I know you will be there, Mr. The Edge. Attire: may I suggest that nice green shirt, the black jeans of your choice, and those boots I just gave you? Oh, and you might want to take a nap beforehand, if you know what I mean and I think you do.'_

.....................................................

I made myself scarce the rest of the day and into the evening. You ate with Adam and Larry while I set the wheels in motion...I was rather proud of myself, truth be told.

(Yes, it's amazing what a person can accomplish with the help of a zealous, smitten concierge and well over a thousand dollars. Good job, B.)

Thank you.

.....................................................

_I found you in your bathtub eating a cupcake._

_'Ahh...the man of the hour has arrived,' you said, patting the chair you had thoughtfully placed near the tub and force-feeding the rest of the cupcake into my mouth. 'Have some wine, too,' you added, handing me a glass of some vintage or other. 'You're not drinking tonight?' I asked, taking a too-quick swallow that must have been worth forty dollars alone._

_'No, love, I'm going to drive us somewhere later tonight. You drink all you want, though.'_

_'You--driving? Where are we going, exactly?'_

_'I'm afraid I can't tell you that, Edge.'_

_'I'll drive.'_

_'I was kind of hoping you'd say that,' you admitted. 'Do you mind?'_

_'It better be good.'_

_'Oh, it is. I'll just drink a little. You stop me, all right?'_

_I nodded and looked at you: soaking wet and naked, except for some humidity-smeared eyeliner and...was that silver nail polish on your toes? I kissed your smirking lips and sighed. Your mouth was divine. 'Is there some reason why there's only water in this tub?' I asked._

_'I already took a shower, Edge, and besides, bubbles do not taste very good.'_

_'That makes sense.'_

_'Let me see those boots of yours, love.' I placed my right foot on the edge of the tub. 'They fit perfectly, don't they?'_

_'Yes. Just right, baby.'_

_'I wish I had nice big feet like yours,' you said, kissing my boot and showcasing your compact, sparkling feet._

_'I like the silver.'_

_'I figured if I had to wear silver every night on stage, I might as well go all-out. Would you like silver toes too, birthday boy?'_

_'Oh, I don't know about that.'_

_'Of course you do. All in good time, Edge.' You batted your eyelashes. 'What...is it smudged?'_

_'I think it looks sexy.'_

_'Tell me why.'_

_'You went to bed with it on. The sex was so intense your eyeliner melted, or maybe it brought tears to your eyes.'_

_'I like the way you think. And the way...Christ, just look at you.'_

_I touched your lower lip. 'It should be red, I know,' you said. 'I couldn't find the lipstick. It must have been lost in the shuffle.' You sucked on my finger thoughtfully and looked over at your tray. 'Hand me a cupcake, please?'_

_I offered you one, and you plucked the red cinnamon candy off the top. You held it up and said, 'Lick it for me, Edge.' Your other wet fingers drew shapes on my neck as I licked the candy. 'I could watch you do that all night,' you said playfully, pulling it away from me. You rolled it over your lips, the red food coloring effectively staining your mouth. 'Now there's something else to smear,' you concluded as you ate your candy and played with my earring. I touched your chin and said, 'So rough...do you want me to...?'_

_'I thought you'd never ask.'_

......................................................

It was the first time we had tried it with me naked and you completely clothed, and I loved the contrast. I felt more helpless than ever. I love to watch you work. We always fall silent while you concentrate and I...take it all in, studying you, falling more deeply in love with you.

(Yes.)

.....................................................

_When I was finished with you, you sank beneath the water's surface to rinse off, emerging as an androgynous, reprobate Venus. 'Edge...' you moaned._

_'Baby,' I murmured, my index fingers tracing your blackened lower eyelids and moving up to your temples, creating two blue Egyptian eyes._

_You kissed me and whispered, 'Tonight I'm Magdalene. Let me take off your boots.' You untied the laces slowly, looking up at me occasionally. 'I don't want to get your clothes all wet, love,' you suggested, and soon I was undressed with my feet dangling in the water._

_'Why is this water still so hot?' I asked._

_'I am in the water, Edge, that's why,' you said, caressing my bare feet with your hands and face. And lips. You were kissing my feet the way you kissed my hands, even sucking my toes and running them through your slick, wet hair. Your posture was reverent and subservient, but as you bit gently into the soft, yielding flesh of my instep, I realized I had never felt less in control of us._

_You opened a small jar. I looked at you curiously. 'Crème de la Mer,' you explained, 'One hundred dollars an ounce.'_

_'How utterly insane,' I laughed as you massaged it into my feet, suddenly all-business. 'Tomorrow your feet will look like the face of a New York socialite,' you claimed._

_'This is the best birthday ever.'_

_'You'd better believe it,' you purred, kissing up my leg from ankle to knee. 'Now hold still. I am going to paint your toenails silver whether you like it or not.' I liked it. I liked watching your workmanlike fingers fumble with the tiny, problematic brush. I liked feeling the unexpectedly cool temperature of the polish as it touched each nail. I liked the charming way you blew on my toes to speed up the drying process. I liked the tender, emotional way you repeated my name over and over. I liked--I love--everything about you._

_'Edge. Edge. Edge.' You stopped, rested your head on my knees, and took both of my hands in yours. 'God, I thank you for this beautiful man, the best friend I've ever known, my brother for whom I would die. I thank you for his presence in my life, for the privilege of even knowing him. I thank you for every breath he takes. He is a gift from you I will never deserve. I love him. And I will love him for the rest of my life. Amen.'_

_You looked up and we stared at each other for quite some time. I counted five sparkles in each eye._

......................................................

You drew my eyes.

.......................................................

_I love you, Bono._

.......................................................

You left two blank pages, and then you glued a piece of colored paper torn from a magazine--a dusky rose-to the following page.

(I know what this is about.)

My favorite color.

......................................................

 _I leaned in to kiss your cinnamon-flavored lips, an extended kiss that took on a life of its own, a kiss with stories to tell, a kiss that took off on rambling tangents yet always managed to swing back to_ _the main thesis. The water seemed reluctant to free you as you pulled yourself out of the tub and up to my lap, your legs straddling me. Steam rose from your dripping body. You were a creature from another world, and you belonged to me that night._

 _You looked down at our twin erections, stroking one, then the other, then both. 'My favorite color,' you said. You bit my earlobe and sighed, 'On my pillow you'll find a blindfold. I want you to put it on_ _me, Edge. I have a theory I want to test tonight.'_

_'What's that?'_

_'Men are visual. If I can't see, my other senses will take over, and I'll feel the way a woman does. That's what I think will happen. Want to help me find out?' You rose, still warm and damp, and led me to your bedroom._

_You transformed the instant I blindfolded you, and I was even more free to experiment with you, so adorably clumsy and vulnerable. Every other sense was heightened, especially hearing and touch. You shifted your head any time a noise was made, and places that were never ticklish before had to be approached cautiously. You became very quiet, and I felt like a farmer rescuing a horse from a burning barn by throwing a coat over the animal's eyes. Later you told me that you were able to rediscover my body by not seeing it._

_That first week in the States marked the beginning of our growing obsession with sixty-nine, and we frequently slept with our heads at opposite ends of the bed for the sake of convenience. I couldn't get over the sight of your greedy mouth, your chin and neck between my legs; most nights that was all it took. You tore off the blindfold as you came, you blue eyes dilated, your mouth screaming and red (ingredients: sugar, Red 40, Yellow 6, confectioner's glaze, artificial flavoring). We held each other and recovered a bit--again your fascination with my feet--and then you said abstractly, '_ _Remember a few years ago, Reg, when we were dressing sort of like Amish people?'_

_'Yes?'_

_'You're much sexier now.'_

_'Thanks. So are you.'_

_'I know. Guess what?'_

_'What...'_

_'We're going to Lancaster County now.'_

_'Because...'_

_'Two things. One: assured anonymity. It's Amish country. Two: a certain meteor shower would be highly visible in an area where there's no electricity whatsoever.'_

_'Oh...baby...'_

_'I heard you today. I heard that hint of melancholy in your voice when you said "country." It's only thirty miles away. I've arranged for us to have a car and everything!'_

_'I'm proud of you, B.'_

_'Me too--let's go.'_

_You acted as navigator, providing semi-accurate information on how to get to Lancaster County. We found an empty pasture, spread a blanket on the ground, and gazed up at the stars, waiting for something to happen. The night air was so fresh and clean it made me rethink everything I knew about oxygen. Eventually brilliant streaks of light lacerated the sky above us, and there was no moon that night to disrupt the display. 'Love, we shine like a burning star, we're falling from the sky, tonight,' you sang, and I didn't have the heart to tell you that what we were seeing was merely a trail of dust left in the wake of a comet. I kissed you during those predawn hours, until we were both covered with dew._

.........................................................

Black background, white streaks, and a quote from Vincent Van Gogh, written on a receipt... 'The best way to know God is to love many things.'

.........................................................

_You are my child. You are my complement. You are my brother. You are my muse. You are my lover. You are my friend. You are my soul. You are my voice. You are my torment. You are my plaything. You are my dream. You are my heart. You are my life. You are many things._

_End._

_*_

_About the author._

_The Edge is the guitarist for U2, an Irish rock band of some note. His plans to own every guitar ever produced are finally coming to pass. This is his first erotic short story, which is a work of nonfiction. Edge lives alone in a photography-filled house in Dublin, Ireland, and he lives with his husband Bono in every major city in the entire world. By the way, he loves you very much, Bono._

 

11: Prelude

(Wake up, baby...)

Mmm, Edge.

(Wake up, love, and sing me a song.)

Tonight, tonight, won't be just any night...

(Fasten your seat belt; we're about to land.)

Landing is never as good as taking off, but in this case I'll make an exception. You're down there somewhere waiting for me, and... Hey, that almost hurt. I'm awake now. This must be how Dorothy felt when her house fell out of the sky. How do I look, Reg?

(Again, I can't see.)

Humor me.

(You look incredible, Bono.)

Good.

(You're not nervous, are you?)

Wouldn't it be great if I were? Maybe I am. I will get back to you on that. Oh Edge, what we're about to do...I feel a little foolish that all this had not happened a long time ago, don't you? It's like I've been poring over my own yard with a metal detector for years and years, finding little scraps and throwing them away, completely oblivious to the lost Greek bronze standing just outside my door.

(Heh.)

What?

(Your back door.)

Unbelievable!

(Sorry.)

That unctuously creepy flight attendant is coming back.

"Pardon me, sir, but apparently you will be exiting the plane first. Your...wow...your 'ride' is waiting for you on the tarmac."

"Excellent."

"Are you famous?"

"I...is it Bryan?...am a rock star."

"Oh! And your name is..."

"Huey Lewis. Thanks a lot, Bryan."

"Y'absolutely!"

"Excuse me. Goodbye, Kilroy."

"You wear sunglasses."

"Yes, I certainly do."

"Watch your step, Mr. Lewis. There you go."

Christ, it's a fucking kiln out here, probably forty degrees warmer than inside the plane, and the sun...blazing and bright as a flashbulb. Why didn't you remind me not to look at it? Now I have a dozen black suns obscuring my field of vision. This jacket is coming off, that's for sure.

Dear god, there is the car.

(Are you alright?)

You know that hill about a mile north of Glenmacnass? The one that drops off a bit too suddenly, and if you're driving fast you almost become airborne for a split second?

(Yeah.)

That's how I feel inside right now...kind of queasy, like I'm about to fall, but at the same time it's kind of exhilarating.

(You are nervous and you are in love. Deep breath. Open the door.)

Okay.

"Edge."

"...Baby."

My eyes adjust to the darkness and there you are, regal and galvanizing, granting me access to your leather cave. You remove my sunglasses and put them in your pocket. Neither of us moves, and then...we smile.

"Well, here we are."

"You always know the right thing to say, Edge."

"I spent the entire ride composing it."

"I missed you."

"See, that was going to be the second thing I'd say."

"Why don't you skip ahead to the third thing?"

"I wasn't going to talk. I planned to pause for a moment and run my finger along this...this perfect line." You touch my jaw and I shiver. "Then I was going to kiss it right here where it changes direction." I feel the icy heat of your mouth.

"And down, to feel your pulse on my lips..."

"Ohh."

"...and the vibration in your throat as you moan."

"Edge..."

"Moan my name."

"Edge..."

"Nice to see you again, B."

I lean back and stare at the car's ceiling, vaguely aware of the airplanes, those strange auxiliary vehicles unique to airports, and the vast ocean of concrete, all of it blurred and existing very much outside the car. My left hand touches the places you kissed. They are still there. There's something new about you today, Edge. You seem...enhanced, in sharp focus, saturated with color somehow.

(That's because you've earned me.)

I have.

"Edge, I have something for you to read."

"You do? What have we here...very interesting. 'Hello Kitty: Come and Play with Me!' B, if this is your way of asking me to treat you like a Japanese schoolgirl, I don't think I can pull it off."

"Just read it. It'll only take about ten minutes. I do believe that with this document I have fulfilled the terms of our contract."

"Alright." You open the notebook and begin to read as I sidle over to your part of the seat. Is there some reason why you have three buttons unfastened, rather than your customary two?

(Baby, if you don't get it by now...)

Of course I get it. You want to entice me. You want me to slip my hand inside your shirt, just for a moment to see if you're wearing my chain. You are. And you're wearing my ring. I lean over to kiss it and your gifted fingers. The one with the ring finds its way into my mouth, and I suck it affectionately as I watch the pendular movement of your eyes.

"Denver omelet?"

"I've never seen anything quite like it, Edge." Should I do it?

(As if I could stop you. You're going to anyway.)

I arrange myself so my head rests comfortably in your lap. You lift the notebook a bit to accommodate me, and I nuzzle my face against your waist, kissing your belt. Leather, cotton, metal, you. Realizing that holding a notebook does not necessarily require two hands, you allow one to stroke my hair. I study you quietly. I love you. Eventually your hand seeks one of mine and holds it tightly. You've reached the scene with the orange slices. Oh god, and I had my head in her lap just like this. How incredibly stupid of me...

(Maybe it's a good thing.)

I don't know.

(It is.)

You look down at me, your selfless eyes lustrous with burgeoning tears. One falls on my forehead and anoints me. You are so angelic I can't bear to look at you. Minutes pass and I begin to mentally draft a letter to the New York Department of Transportation...could the roads leading into the city be in worse shape? Any provocative ideas I may have had about my face and your lap are completely out of the question now. Your hand moves up to caress my cheekbone, but one particularly diabolical pothole turns it into more of a slap. We both start laughing and I sit up.

"Say something in German for me, B."

"Give me a second. Okay. Haben Sie etwas dagegen, wenn wir auf threm Grundstuck zelten?"

"Yes, that was indeed lush and post-coital. What does it mean?"

"Do you mind if we camp on your property?"

A slow explosion of hilarity racks your body, beginning in your torso before it ultimately spreads to your extremities. "You never know when a sentence like that will come in handy, Edge." You take me in your arms and place a gawky kiss my lips, both of us silly and juvenile.

"You know what I miss?"

"What's that, Edge?"

"Those days after school when you would come over to my house and we'd sit around listening to records."

"That seems so long ago, doesn't it? We had so many big ideas...but I can't remember half of what we talked about. It doesn't matter, really. I mean, I was thrilled to have found someone who actually understood me. And still liked me."

"That's all anybody wants."

"I'd watch you play along with the songs--simple stuff--and I wanted to be you."

"I'd watch you...I'd just watch you smile and I wanted to be you."

"Oh, Edge."

I tap the notebook and you pick up where you left off. The car ambles through the streets of Harlem. People are sitting on stoops, relishing the last weekend of the summer. A little girl with an ice cream cone waves at the mystery people in the big black car with the smoky windows. I press my palm to the warm glass as we pass her. A finger trails down my spine. "Familiar roads."

I kiss your cheek. "You'll never let me get lost."

"This must have been the most difficult thing you've ever done."

"I had to do it."

"You did it for us."

"Yes."

"I love you. More than ever." You've done it again. All it takes are a few well-chosen words or a simple gesture from you, and I'm shy, I'm excited...and I can tell you're about to add something only you could add.

(How do you know that?)

Wheels are turning; it's as plain as day. Here it comes.

"Yes, Edge?"

"I'm in love with the eleventh version of you."

What did I tell you? "Would you like to explain that one, Reg, or should we keep it poetic and mysterious for a while?"

"By the time a person is eighteen, the cells of their skeleton have duplicated nine times. After that, it's a new skeleton every ten years. You're right in the middle of number eleven."

"No kidding?"

"I'm not exactly sure how the rest of the body ages. I think you get a new one every seven years or something, but I might be wrong there."

"I don't care if you're wrong; I like that idea. It explains a lot about the band, for one thing. It seems like we've changed radically every seven years or so. 1997 should be an interesting year. But back to us. What do you love about my eleventh skeleton, Edge?"

"It's your second one as an adult. As a man."

"A man. That turns you on, doesn't it?"

"You know it does." You hold my left wrist tightly, squeezing it until I become aware of my own underlying bone structure and consequently yours. "I love that you're a man." You bring my wrist to your mouth, but you stop as we involuntarily lurch forward and the car comes to a screeching halt in the middle of Fifth Avenue. You roll down the window and look outside. "Traffic jam, maybe some kind of accident up ahead. We might be stuck here for a while."

"Is that a fact... Can I have some money?"

"Why?"

"Look," I say, pointing at a sidewalk vendor who has set up shop near the Metropolitan Museum of Art. "He's selling sunglasses, Reg--I want to buy you some." I invade your pockets. "If you have any cash, love, I will find it."

"Oh, all right," you say, slipping a twenty into my hands.

"You will not be disappointed," I promise.

The salesman's face is a compelling advertisement for sunscreen. It looks like a dried riverbed photographed by a satellite. I know exactly what to ask for. "Good afternoon. I need two pairs of sunglasses: one pink, one green. Do you have them?" He has them. "Perfect. Three dollars each? Keep the change." I sprint back to the car. Elapsed time: sixty seconds, if that.

I hand you the green ones. "I'll take it as a personal affront if you don't wear them, love." You free them from their plastic wrapper and put them on. They are suitably hilarious. I put mine on and run through my arsenal of eyewear poses.

(Christ, could you be more gay?)

I can think of one way, Reg.

You peek over your green lenses and gaze at me intently, saying, "The pink makes your eyes look purple."

"Make the traffic move, please." We kiss. Your mouth...all tongue...reminds me of the things you're going to do to me later. I want your hands on my body. I want you inside me. Fuck. "Talk to me, Edge."

"What would you like to hear?"

"Tell me one sexy word and I'll match it."

You kiss behind my ear and whisper, "Penchant."

I move my hand up your thigh. "Insatiable."

Your fingers graze the hair on my right arm. "Obedient."

I bite your neck. "Virgin."

You reach under my shirt. "Lover."

I bring your fingers to my lips. "Mavorneen." You look at me questioningly. "It means 'my darling.' It's Irish. I'm surprised you don't know it, Edge."

You clutch my face and kiss me roughly. "Tart."

I can't possibly beat that. Or can I? I raise an eyebrow and smile. "Concupiscence."

"English, please?"

"Strong sexual desire, lust."

"Really? The definition is better than the word."

"Top it, if you can."

I feel your hand slither beneath my belt, and soon it strokes me with practiced fingers. You remove our sunglasses, stare into my eyes for a moment, and kiss my forehead tenderly. "Mine."

Mine. "You win, Edge. You win every time." I slide down the seat and brazenly offer my body to you. Anything you want.

The car staggers forward. We're moving...we are in fact closer to the Plaza than I thought. "Edge, my god, this is happening. You're going to take me up to your room and fuck me, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Say that again."

"Yes."

"I need it so badly, love."

"I know you do. So do I." You sit up straight and I try to do the same.

"What are you not telling me?"

"We're going to the bar downstairs, the Oak Bar, to have a drink. We need to talk about it first."

"If you say so."

"I think you'll like what I'm going to say."

...................................................................

You ask for a quiet table in a dark corner of the bar, where we sit and await our drinks. The room is probably exquisite, with loads of discriminating details, but really, who cares? Apparently there will be no talking until the drinks arrive. I shred a piece of paper. You watch me fidget with a small vase holding...it looks like an orchid. I give it a little kiss for you.

The drinks come. I can't be bothered to wonder what they are. They're brownish.

"What is it you needed to tell me, Edge?"

"I thought we should establish a few ground rules."

What's that mean?

(Your guess is as good as mine, B.)

"Okay. Which are...?"

"We've been exploring quite a bit over the past few months...you've been a boy for me..."

"...I've been a girl for you."

"But tonight, this first time, you know what I thought would be even sexier?"

"What?"

"If you were...just you. I don't want you to hide behind a mask. I want a man tonight."

"You want me."

"Naked, submissive, yes, but you will be a man who has actively chosen to be those things for me."

"I love it."

"Behave, B, we're in public. Look around a little, don't just stare at me.

"That's better. You. Me. A bed. That's all I want tonight."

"What else are you going to do to me, Edge?"

"I'm not going to tie you up. I don't need to. You won't be going anywhere. I might hold you down if you need that. And you've been dropping all kinds of ungainly hints; I know you want me to spank you sometime, Bono. You want me to take you over my knee and you want it to hurt. We'll see. As it stands right now, do I think you'll be able to handle even the most rudimentary sex with me? Just barely."

"God..."

"You might even faint."

"Edge."

"If it starts to become too intense for you, we need to have a word you can say, and then I'll stop."

"I can't say no?"

"Sometimes when people say no they mean yes."

"What word should I use?"

"Orchid."

"Yes."

"Now here is what will happen. I'm going up to the room. You will stay here, finish your drink, and calm down. Then, when you're ready...ready for me, I want you to come to room 1013 and I'll give you what you need. What you have earned."

"You always know the right thing to say."

"I've been rehearsing this for seven months. I'll see you in a little while, Bono."


	5. Closest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I about lost my mind when they played the song from my little singalong at the beginning of this chapter during the 360 tour, of course. Fan service? 
> 
> "I just can't seem to get close enough," is a line from a Prince song. Prince is all over this thing in one way or another. I will always love him.
> 
> One word in this chapter is the title of the story I wrote not long after I finished this. And as much as E loves mirrors, B's take on that was just a little bit wrong. You'll see.
> 
> Close/Closer/Closest were written with love, and I've had fun putting them back together for you here. Thanks one more time to everyone who has read this story over the years. I think my favorite comment about the ending came the night I originally posted it: "This chapter is like Christmas morning, and there's a pony! For us!" 
> 
> Let's go check out this pony.

12: Closest

What are you smiling at?

(How do you know I'm smiling?)

Tell me one reason why you wouldn't be smiling.

(I can't think of any. That was good, "you, me, a bed.")

Four little words.

(More intense than any scenario you might devise.)

And somehow you knew that...it's as if you've been keeping a sexual dossier on me since January, and on the last page you have written, "Take off his masks."

(Look around, love.)

Why?

(Your whole world will change after tonight.)

The bar overlooks Central Park. Diagonal shafts of light graze the treetops, still dark green but with suggestions of olive and gold. One prematurely red tree stands among them, small and match-like, tossing its leaves into the air like pennies into a wishing well. I stand and walk over to the window. I know I shouldn't touch the glass but I can't help myself; I outline the shape of the red tree with my finger. I look around the room and suddenly everything I see becomes precious to me: ethereal smoke rings rising from a cigar, an old man with immaculately polished shoes drinking alone, light reflecting on a silver knife. Soon I'll see all of it with new eyes. I make my way to the exit, but before I leave I turn around to take one last look...the way I always glance back at my home before you and I disappear into the sky.

"Tenth floor, please."

Oh Edge, listen to this...

(Sing me a song.)

For you? The world.

"Do any of you mind if I sing along?"

"Uh...no, go ahead."

"Fine with me."

" _And all this science I don't understand...It's just my job five days a week...A rocket man, a rocket man..._ sing with me, love, you know you want to..."

" _And I think it's gonna be a long long time...'til touchdown brings me round again to find..._ "

"Tenth floor, sir."

"Don't stop singing on my account."

"Hey. You're...?"

"Yes I am...I'm a rocket man."

I watch my feet move beneath me. I'm sure the hallway is impeccable. There may even be imaginative floral arrangements and moldings fraught with symbolism, but all I know is one right turn, one more right turn, 1009, 1011, 1013. I kiss my fingers and stroke the numbers, two of them neat, economical lines, two of them curvaceous and fluid...our room. I touch the doorknob and hear a click.

You are waiting for me on the other side, standing in an atmosphere of pure indulgence and amphetaminic upkeep. A halo of light from the chandelier surrounds your face as you smile and I begin to babble.

"Everyone else has moved on to Philadelphia, then?"

"All gone."

"And we're leaving first thing tomorrow."

You nod.

"Thus ending our reign of Gaelic terror here at the Plaza. What?"

Still smiling, you take my things, drape my jacket over a chair, and say, "I love you." As you approach, I intuitively step back until I feel door number 1013 pressing against my shoulder blades. Cool and quiet, your lips become a meandering river casually seeking its delta. I open my eyes as you kiss me. You are happy. You are finally happy.

You exhale. Your nose bumps against mine. You clear your throat. You shift your weight to your right foot. Everything you do is a tiny miracle. I am hopelessly in love with you. You begin to shimmer like a Moroccan horizon.

"Baby, don't--" you say.

"I'm not...I...I just love you...and you're...look at you, you're perfect."

"Shhh."

"It's like we don't even need to do this."

"I know." You untuck my shirt.

"Kissing...I can scarcely deal with it...only kissing." Your fingers systematically undo seven buttons.

"Only kissing." You're stripping me.

"That first night--here in this very building--thank god for your restraint, Edge." I kick off my boots, and they hit the wall with inelegant thuds. You kneel before me and kiss my thighs as you help me out of my pants. Your hands on my skin...

"Naked."

"You've opened so many beautiful doors for me by keeping them closed."

"Mine."

"Yours."

These monosyllabic responses of yours, punctuated with still more kisses, surpass my attempts at conversation. I'm naked; you examine me and say, "You're...outlandishly sexy, do you know that?" Your fingers move across my chest.

"Edge?"

"Baby."

I look into your eyes. "We need to do this."

"I know."

We both know that once the floodgates open and I start to moan there will be no stopping me. You take a nipple between your lips and I begin in earnest. We hear several voices passing in the hallway and I stop. But we don't know them. "Beg for it," you say. "Tell them what you want." All right.

"Oh please, love, please go down on me, dear god I love your mouth..."

The voices pause then laugh. You slam me against the door ostensibly for dramatic effect, demanding, "More."

"Don't stop, don't you dare stop..."

The voices seem to be further down the hall. "Have fun, boys," one of them calls.

"You little exhibitionist."

"It was your idea, the Edge." I pull you up to receive my kisses--you seem to tower over me.

(That is because I'm still wearing shoes.)

Of course. Do I know you? You've been awfully quiet.

(I am working on a project.)

What, are we boring you?

(Not at all. I'm enjoying this. It's called multitasking.)

Project. You do that, Edge. I'm going to concentrate on...

(...kissing your boyfriend?)

Yes. My boyfriend and I are going to kiss for a while, and then after a few more preliminaries, he's going to fuck me. You might want to pencil this into your day planner. Multitasking...

(Stop thinking.)

Alright. Where was I? Still pinned to the door, and your body presses so hard against mine I gasp. I can hardly breathe.

"Edge...?"

"Oh--I'm sorry. I just can't seem to get close enough."

"Well, with all these undone buttons, this shirt of yours is a mere formality." I maintain eye contact as I remove it. "Much better." My mouth flies to your neck and finds a home just below your chin, but before I can really explore it, you pull away. Taking my hand, you lead me to a full-length mirror. Again. Your adorable fetish.

"What would you like to watch us do tonight?"

"I want you to see what I see."

"Such as...?"

"Everything that makes you a man." You stand behind me, your hands on either side of my face, tracing the lines of my nose and chin and along my neck and shoulders. Fingers stroke the length of my arms and linger on my chest, identifying favorite freckles and incidental scars. I lean against you a bit; your movements are comfortingly mesmerizing. Your hands travel lower, and I watch the left one stroke an erection that needs no further encouragement while the right one cups my balls. Fuck, they belong to you tonight.

"Where would you like it?"

"Sorry?"

"I'm going to mark you as mine now. Where would you like it?"

"Oh. Wherever you say, Edge."

"I want you to describe what I'm doing to you."

"Mmm. You're biting my left shoulder."

"Who am I?"

"You're Edge. You are the man I love, and your teeth are...at my shoulder. You're sucking me, hard, and it hurts and I'm Bono and we're men and...I...tomorrow you will see it and remember, you'll know that I am yours...and your hands understand exactly what I want, you always know."

"There. Do you think it's dark enough? Do you like it?"

"Only if you do, love...but yes. And that's my favorite color."

"True. You're so hard, baby."

"You make me that way." I feel you thrust against me. "And I could say the same of you."

"Turn around and face me." You kiss me full on the mouth as your hands hold my erection captive. I try but I can't make my arms encircle your neck; they fall to my sides helplessly. "Bono, you're so perfectly hard, aren't you? And you want my cock so badly you can..."

"...taste it." I fall to my knees. Four hands make short work of the rest of your clothes and soon you thrust into my mouth, so familiar yet never the same. You're warm, earthy, plus something else I can't quite isolate...could that be new car? But how?

"Open your eyes. Look at what I'm doing to you." I glance at the mirror at an image that still has the power to startle me. "I'm fucking your mouth, Bono, and you're so good because you love to suck me, you love to suck me, don't you? Yes, you do, you're so good..." Tiny, simple, exciting words. My hands slide up to your hips, pulling you closer, taking you deeper. No, it never gets old. "And it doesn't end here."

Your hands, buried in my hair, tilt my face up. Our eyes meet and you mouth the words, "Let's go to bed."

I hesitate. "Would you like me to take a shower first because, I don't know, I'm probably a little stale...or..."

"No, baby. I like you this way." I lower my eyes. I've been begging for this for months. Why am I stalling? "We can clean you up after...if you want..." I follow your lips blindly as we stumble to the bedroom, which is illuminated by the reflected light of what must be a dazzling sunset. I wander over to the window to view it, but all I can see is a section of the eastern sky. You wrap the light blue lace curtain around us and we stand there quietly. Inhaling. Exhaling. I look over at the trees. I close my eyes.

"Orchid." You kiss my temple. "I'm nervous."

"Baby."

"I want this, I really do, but I'm...just tell me...talk to me..."

"I'd never do anything to hurt you, love." I smile. "Unless that's what you wanted," you add teasingly.

"I could listen to your voice until the end of time, Edge, do you know that?"

"You're always fascinated by the things you fear...but you know you need this. You trust me. More?"

"Yes."

"You want to know what it feels like, baby, don't you? You're very curious. Sexier?"

"Yes."

"I'm sure it will hurt a little, but in my experience you've always liked a bit of pain. And I've trained you so well, haven't I? Dirtier?"

"Oh yes."

"Still so hard, aren't you? Since you are a virgin--my virgin--I'll be very gentle, I promise. But after tonight, Bono, I plan to fuck you hard and often."

"My god."

"Now can we do this or do I have to beg?"

"Maybe just a little."

"Please let me fuck you."

"That will do nicely."

"Bed?"

"Yes."

You embrace me as we stand inside our lace cocoon. "So in love with you."

The sheets are white, soft as the skin of a certain guitarist's inner wrists, and they inspire any number of matrimonial thoughts. "Aren't you going to pick me up and set me on the bed?" I ask with a leer. "That's what grooms do, you know."

You laugh and hold your chin in your hand. "Orchid," you announce as you walk away.

"Get back here..." I whine. "I need sex."

"Are you absolutely sure about that?"

"Yes!"

I lie on the bed and watch you push all the blankets to one side. "It's getting dark in here," I say, taking in the dim opulence. I hear a short exhalation--possibly an eighteenth of a laugh--as you turn on one of the bedside lamps. The room instantly transforms; we are in an undersea palace. "A blue party bulb? For me? Ahh Edge, you shouldn't have." You are luminous and otherworldly. For a second I wish you really had blue skin.

"Try the other lamp." I can't help admiring my own blue arm as I reach for the switch. Pink. The colors combine at the center of the bed. "Does this remind you of anything?"

We lie down together, facing each other. I smile. "I see a horrid room...with a broken heater...two boys, one pretending to be asleep, one decidedly not asleep...irises...lavender light."

"That's right." You tuck an errant strand of hair behind my ear.

"Back then I wanted to win you over more than the audience, sometimes. More than anyone else, I wanted you to love me, Edge. That's still the case."

"Tell me, baby, what did you want me to do when you whispered my name all those years ago?"

"God...anything, just anything." I take your hand and kiss it acquisitively. I covet your genius hands, with their artistic fingers I'll never possess, each with its own brain, no doubt.

"Did you want me to come to your bed...to touch you like this?"

"Yes."

"Did you want me to kiss you? Because I think that's what you miss the most. Kissing is something you can't duplicate no matter how hard you try. That and the feeling of another person's arms--my arms--surrounding you, your skin warming mine."

"Edge."

"I can endure it longer than you. One week you can handle. Two weeks, and you're touching people unnecessarily, putting your arms around waists, sitting a little too close. Three weeks...you're drinking more, jumping into laps, hugging total strangers, kissing your 'brothers' onstage."

"It's true."

"When what you really need is this." You draw me to your chest and hold me there as you caress my back. "And someone to praise your perfect body." Your heartbeat and purple shadows on your face...no, I can't put two thoughts together. "Turn over." I love being under the microscope of your eyes, the subject of your inventive hypotheses. "Your skin, your hair, these curves..." you say, "from the back you could almost be a woman." I sigh and sigh again; I begin to feel your weight--partially, teasingly. You lift my hair, kissing and biting the back of my neck. "No one ever gets to see this." Your chest hair is maddening as it grazes my back, and I feel your hard cock between my parted legs.

How can you come up with sentences that contain actual ideas, while I struggle to grasp basic nouns such as "pillowcase" and "headboard"? I'm the mouthpiece; I should have the ability to say something on my behalf.

"More," I say, shoving my hips up to meet yours in the most undignified manner possible. More. Yes, that's the kind of eloquence that will earn me the Nobel prize for foreplay one day.

You chuckle and slap my backside mischievously. "If you say so, baby." Your hands are at my hips, coaxing me to turn over. "It might be easier that way, but I want you on your back. I want to make sure you're okay, and I want you to see me."

I do as you say and impulsively sit up for another lavender kiss. "This is really going to happen," I whisper.

"Lie back, love, relax. I need to get you ready for me. And yes, it really is." You slide a pillow beneath me. You reach for things you will need.

I look at the ceiling and think of all my predecessors, occupants of this three thousand dollar a night bed who have found themselves on their backs, admiring carvings of...what are those, peacocks? I look at your dear face, half blue, half pink, as you do things to me. I imagine you perusing a New York City telephone book, locating a likely store, and going there by yourself to ask for a purple light bulb. And when they said they didn't have any, you knew what colors make purple. I look out the window. The sun has set, but a sort of wraparound effect has caused the eastern horizon to match the lighting in this room. The din of early evening traffic is not much of a factor up here; I can hear a distinct click as I bite my own slightly salty thumbnail.

Needless to say, your fingers are driving me to the brink of madness, and I think you have been staring at me for quite some time. I have forgotten to breathe.

"Ask me, Bono."

Reality hits me and I gasp for air. "Please...Edge, fuck me. I need it, I need you inside me." Those words. I can barely breathe. "Edge? Please."

"Calm down, baby." You kiss my chest. "I love you."

"Edge."

"Mine."

"Yours."

"Now."

"Now."

I take one last fleeting glance--lavender walls, a windowsill--and close my eyes. And. There it is, there you are. My mouth opens and my head thrusts back. It's starting and it seems impossible...I need to get past this first difficult hurdle. My face feels hot. I break out in a hot sweat and I shudder, but I look up at your concerned eyes and nod. Go on. Penetrate me. Fuck me.

Another push. We gasp simultaneously. You find it. You're there. Conflicting messages of pleasure and pain race to my brain but only one receives an audience. I cry out...vowels.

"What am I doing to you, Bono?"

"Edge, you're fucking me, you're inside me and you're fucking me, dear god you're fucking me, oh love give me more...slowly."

"Slowly."

As thoroughly as you had prepared me, I never knew it would be like this. To see your face above mine, the weight of your body driving us, the sounds you're beginning to make...consonants. "I'm a man, Edge...you're fucking me. And I want it."

"All of it."

"All." You bite your lower lip. We look down between my parted legs. You moan as I say, "Look at what you're doing to me." Your arms support most of your weight, and my fingers admire the contours of a straining bicep, a lovely blue vein, and then down to touch myself. I can't help it.

You compose yourself. "You're divine, this is..."

"Help me," I whimper, thrusting against your stomach.

You lean on one arm and brush my hand aside. "Let me. You love it, I can tell...so hard you're about to burst out of your skin, aren't you?"

"Edge, this is too much."

"Go ahead, scream for me."

This combination of thrusting and stroking: I could very easily faint, but if I did I would miss more of...your cock, your hands... "Yes, yes, Edge, fuck, talk to me, Edge..."

You are having your own technical difficulties; tremors pulse through your poor arm. You're already doing two things, and now I want more. "You want me to..."

"...talk."

"What do you want me to say?"

"Tell me a secret, Edge, tell me a fantasy, please? Something you've never told me...I know you must have dozens. God, I love how you fuck me."

"Are you sure?"

"Please."

"What I say will...fuck, you're so tight baby...what I say might...make you come. I know it'll make me..."

"Tell me Edge, please sir tell me, oh you're so big, tell me love, I want to...I'm so close...your hips, my god, you're inside me...you're...oh...tell me."

"Shh."

"Tell me."

"Shh. I want the back of your neck." I turn my head to the side as far as I can. You remove my pillow so I can give you more. I feel your lips, your unusually sultry breath, and finally your animalistic teeth biting into my flesh. You kiss my earring and whisper, "We can't do this now." You punctuate your sentence with a slow thrust, and once again I realize you're fucking me and this is real. "We'll have to wait a couple of years, maybe."

"Fuck, Edge, tell me."

"You might not want to do it."

"But I will I promise I will please Edge, I'm closer than ever, I'm almost there..."

"Shh."

"I love you."

"Beautiful man."

"...do anything you say."

"One day after this tour is over..."

"Christ."

"You know I love your neck." You kiss my hair.

"Love your cock."

"One day we're going to..."

"Edge..."

"...cut..."

"Edge..."

"...all of this..."

"Edge..."

"...short."

"Edge, yes."

"Shorter than Larry's, even."

"Yes."

"So I can have your neck."

"Love."

"All of it exposed."

"Anything you say."

"Mine whenever I want it."

"Yes, it's yours."

"And then when I take you..."

"Take me."

"Take you from behind..."

"My neck nice and, oh fuck me, clean and so..."

"...butch..."

"Edge."

"I'll know I'm fucking a man."

"Fucking a man, Christ when did you...?"

"Months ago."

"You want me butch."

"Yes."

"Fuck."

"Yes."

"Yes."

"Bono..."

"Edge..."

I can't fucking see anymore, and our screams, you're screaming too...a strong vibration begins rack our bodies as our capsule re-enters the earth's atmosphere, and our joined flesh is glowing, orange, burning, and about to disintegrate.... As we crash into the white ocean you look into my eyes and cry out my name.

"Edge, I'm..."

*

*

(Where the hell am I?)

(Ehm...)

(Oh my god. Is that you, Reg?)

(Bono. It worked...uhh, welcome, I guess.)

(I'm in...?)

(This is Bono's brain. Real Bono, that is.)

(This place is a mess.)

(I know. That's an interesting...look.)

(Real Reg and I decided that I should wear gold now. The horns were my idea.)

(Can you believe it? They finally did it.)

(Thanks to me.)

(And?)

(I'm sure you helped out from time to time in your own little way. Nice hat. Oh, so now you're going to roll your eyes at me too.)

(Those horns suit you.)

(Question, Reg: why should they have all the fun?)

(If you want a kiss you're going to have to call me 'sir.')

(Unbelievable. Get over here, 'sir.')

*

*

"...coming."

"My god."

"Edge, that was..."

"Baby. I love you."

"It was...the weirdest thing just happened."

"I know."

"The voices? You heard them too, Edge?"

"Yes. We'll have to...are they still there?"

Reg?

(He's gone. He left when you...finished.)

I see.

"Ehm...it's back to normal now, Edge."

"Yeah. Me too."

"We can talk about it tomorrow. Damn. I'm still..."

"...reeling."

"Perfect."

"Yes, baby."

"You prepared me so well...but..."

"It was so...oh my god."

"Yeah. You think you know, but you have no idea."

"Exactly, love."

You turn off the lamps and we hold each other in the fading light. Sunset, dusk, and twilight. We kiss and watch ourselves fade to black.


End file.
